the December 2010 issue

Transcription

for curious artists
and scientists
“I try to evoke a smile
with my illustrations”
Matt Pearce
1
Singularity • December 2010
December 2010
4
Hand-drawn digital art
Interview with Matt Pearce, digital artist and illustrator.
13
Singapore Philatelic Museum
A visit to a museum of stamps, split into 3.
59
14
Iron Man
27
Museum exhibits
46
G. R. Lambert
Cosplay at Anime Festival Asia
I only recognised Bayonetta and Final Fantasy characters...
2
from the editor
As we wind down to the end of the year 2010, I think about dreams. Big
dreams. Have you thought about yours?
What did you plan to accomplish this year? Have you succeeded? Have you
failed? Have you acted and done anything in the first place?
This isn't a chastisement. I believe if you truly want something, you'll find a
way to obtain it. That's your motivation right there. I haven't achieved
some of the goals I set (such as universal popularity of Singularity
*cough*), but the last couple of weeks gave me an abrupt turn of personal
goals. I have a deadline, but it's not the end of the year. And I'm
determined to make something happen before that personal deadline. I'm
drawing energy from that big dream of mine.
Speaking of drawing, I'm pleased to present to you an interview with Matt
Pearce, a digital artist and illustrator. His art makes me smile when I look at
them.
We have a large collection of photos in this issue, from Iron Man to stamps
to old Singapore to cosplayers. I hope you enjoy this issue, and I'll see you
next year.
Vincent Tan
3
I'm on Twitter too!
Hand-drawn
digital art
with Matt Pearce
In a chain of fortunate coincidence, I discovered the work of Matt Pearce
through mindless web surfing targeted research. He designed the blog for
Iain Broome, whom I interviewed in the previous issue. When I saw the
blog design, I was struck by how refreshingly simple it was.
Now I’ve seen blogs and websites with complex photographic designs,
minimalistic looks and many variations in between. This is simple, clean
and dare I say it, childlike. It’s a fun design! I feel happy when I look at it.
I’ll confess to you here, when I was preparing the previous issue, I’ve
already decided I was going to interview Matt. So here you have it, enjoy
the interview.
4
Tell us a little about yourself. How did you come to be an illustrator?
I’ve always loved drawing and painting, it was the one thing I did well at
school. I knew then that it was a creative career I wanted to pursue, and I
never really considered anything else. I studied a diploma in design at the
West Surrey School Art and Design, I then went on to complete a degree in
Graphic Design at Leeds Metropolitan University and graduated in 1995!!!
I got myself an agent within 3 month of graduating and thought that I
would be well on my way to a flourishing illustration career. I got
commissioned to illustrate a children’s book, spent day and night for 4
weeks doing the best job I could, whilst working part time cleaning
computers to pay the bills. I sent in the work on time, only to be told that
there was a problem with the publishing company and that my book
wouldn’t be getting published! I was also told that I would only be paid a
third of the original fee!
Two months later I was in an airport departure lounge going on holiday. I
went to the bookstore to get a book for my holiday and saw the book that
I had done the illustrations for sitting in the bookstore.
Not the best start to my illustration career.
Things never really got going after that and I spent next two
years doing odd jobs just to pay the bills, which mainly
consisted of answering customer service calls for a credit
company. I decided to keep illustrating in my spare time to
develop my portfolio.
In 1999, after 2 years of dealing with customer complaints I
got a chance to create an intranet website for the credit
company I was working for, and never looked back. I realised
that there was a whole new area of design that I could use
my skills that I had learnt and put them to good use… Digital
Art!!!
Since then I’ve learned to adapt my skills to create not only
digital illustration but also how to incorporate it with web
design, app design, e-learning and most recently video and
animation in my current role as a multimedia designer.
Who (or what) influenced you the most with regards to your illustration? Why is that?
I love the way children draw, the
innocent way in which they
interpret the world and the fact
that they don’t care if something
doesn’t quite look right. I think that
this is reflected in my own style as
being quite childlike.
Traditional artists such as David Hockney
also inspire me, and of course the Internet is
a bottomless pit of inspiration, far too much
for me to single one particular source of
influence or inspiration.
Tell us about the tools you use for your work. What do you
like most about the tools?
I mainly use digital tools these days, though I do still have a
sketchbook and pencil, I often sketch things out using
Photoshop and then bring those sketches to life using digital
tools.
I work mainly with the Adobe suite such as Flash, Photoshop
and Illustrator. But I also like to use 3D software such as
Electric Rain’s Swift 3D for 3D vector illustration. I’ve also
recently started creating animations and motion graphics
with After Effects.
The thing I love most about working digitally is the ‘CTRL Z’ or
‘CMD Z’, being able to undo a mistake is invaluable. Also the
freedom to scale, rotate and move things around to get the
composition looking right.
8
I get a "raw"
feelin
ok o
strations, a lo
lu
il
r
u
o
y
m
o
g fr
f rough and
u ach
it. How do yo
to
re
tu
a
n
freeform
ieve that loo
k?
I think there is a tendency to rely on computers
doing a lot of the work for you, and this can
sometimes mean that the artist’s personality is
often lost or watered down.
I try to keep a hand-drawn look to my work, but to
do this is really hard to do when software is always
trying to smooth out lines you draw and guess the
shape you are trying to draw. In terms of achieving
the ‘raw’ look and feel, I use a graphics tablet to
draw and hopefully maintain some of the handdrawn look and feel.
The hardest environment I find to develop a consistent style is 3D, when you get it right it can look really good,
and there’s the advantage of being able to use lighting tools, camera and rendering techniques. I have discovered
Electric Rain’s excellent bit of software called Swift 3D. It allows you to draw a flat vector shape in Flash or
Illustrator and import that flat shape into Swift 3D and extrude the shape to create 3D objects, doing it this way
I’ve found that all the little imperfections that add character to an illustration are carried over to the 3D
modelling process and hopefully create the ‘raw’ hand crafted look to my work.
9
How do you come up with an illustration (framing, characters, and objects)? Is there a
concept you want to portray, or a feeling you want to evoke?
The main reaction or feeling I try to evoke is a smile. Pure and simple.
Any advice for other illustrators and artists?
The best piece of advice is to stick at it, never give up; I had a terrible start to my career.
These are exciting times to be a digital artist, there are so many more possibilities to get
your work out there and get your work seen.
10
I thank Matt Pearce for the interview, and the use of his images and
photos. You can find out more about Matt at www.mattpearce.co.uk
One of the digital tools that Matt uses is Swift 3D, which is produced by
Electric Rain. You can find out more at www.erain.com
11
Singapore Philatelic Museum
We are going to visit the Singapore Philatelic Museum (www.spm.org.sg),
frozen in time at the start of November that is. You’re going to get a treat.
Other than the stamp exhibits in the museum, there was a special exhibition
of Iron Man, and photos taken by G. R. Lambert. There will thus be 3
sections, composed mostly of photos. We’ll visit the Iron Man exhibition,
then the museum itself, then end off with photos taken by Lambert.
All photos here taken with an iPhone 3G. Bluriness and shakiness are my
fault. Let the journey begin.
13
My suspicion is that
most visitors came
for this exhibition...
14
The red Iron Man apparently
had real hair used! I think the
modeler used his own hair.
Life-size Iron Man suit
15
We have a new element, people...
16
17
I don’t think I’ve seen this version of Iron Man before...
18
19
20
21
These are 2 of the most unusual versions I’ve seen.
22
23
24
25
And next, we check out the “normal” exhibits in
Singapore Philatelic Museum.
26
So stamps signify that the package they
were attached to were “paid with love”?
27
I look cooler than Daniel Radcliffe, don’t I?
28
That would be me in the reflections. This section of the
museum had pullout contraptions containing stamps from
different countries in different years.
Due to the lighting and position of the contraptions, it’s really
hard to get a good photo.
29
Postage must be really expensive if this is the entire letter...
30
These were the old postboxes in Singapore.
31
32
The mailman’s uniform.
33
Calculated manually?!?!
34
That’s a lot of equipment to send and process mail, isn’t it?
Makes you appreciate electronic mail or email, doesn’t it? Unless
you’re drowning in hundreds or thousands of emails… It was
prohibitive and expensive to send physical mail, that’s why you get so
few of it. But we can get to that discussion some other time.
35
36
Is that how post offices
of old look like?
Remember that people
in the old days didn’t
have many options of
contacting their families
back home, wherever
home was.
It’s not like they could
Twitter or Facebook their
families...
37
38
39
40
It may look like it, but physically
there’s no Chinese dude there…
It’s just really photorealistic.
41
42
On the right, we have
Russian, German and Belgian
post boxes respectively.
More post boxes coming up.
43
44
Don’t bother going to the site. I checked, and it seems
defunct. Your best bet is to use the Wayback Machine and
see how it looked like in the past. Yeah, no more Jedi mail...
45
46
47
48
Here’s something
to think about:
According to my
friend, in the early
days of Singapore,
a Japanese woman
in Singapore was
most likely selling
her body as a
means of living.
According to that
same friend, they
had competition
from Hainanese
boys…
I will leave it to you
if you want to
verify that piece of
Singapore history.
49
I believe 5 cents in Singapore 1908 is a lot of money...
50
51
52
I don’t think the road was even paved… Is that a trishaw on the right?
53
Horse carriages gave way to human-powered trishaws.
Because horses, well, leave… stuff on the ground...
54
I think this was a kampong (Malay village) during a flood. But the children
don’t seem to care… At least I think they’re having fun swimming...
55
56
And that ends the visit to the Singapore Philatelic Museum. It’s
situated at
23-B Coleman Street, Singapore 179807
Find out more at the website www.spm.org.sg
57
Subscribe for free!
Have the magazine sent to your email
inbox every month by subscribing at
polymathprogrammer.com/singularity
There's also a free ebook!
Even monsters want it!
58
Cosplay at Anime Festival Asia
The Anime Festival Asia (AFA) was held in Singapore, 12th to
14th of November 2010. The cheapest entrance ticket was S$8.
Being the struggling practical writer that I was, I went to the
exhibition hall where it’s free to enter.
It turns out that all the cosplayers were here. Cosplay is short for
“costume play”. Participants wear costumes depicting characters
from comics (or manga in Japanese), video games, and movies
amongst other sources.
I don’t recognise many of the characters depicted, but I snapped
pictures nevertheless. I could cite the poor lighting, plain
background, the iPhone and moving crowd for the poor quality
of photos, but they’re just excuses. I suck at taking photos…
© Aaron Neo
And on the left, we have Bayonetta from the video game,
Bayonetta, who’s a witch and whose clothes are her hair.
Obviously, the cosplayer can’t be that skimpily dressed...
59
The hat looks
cute, what
can I say...
60
This is Sephiroth, from the video game Final Fantasy VII.
The muscles are not a costume. This guy did serious work
in the gym… We also have another Sephiroth on the right.
61
Vampires at a ball?
62
63
I can’t do bokeh effects,
but I have Paint.NET...
64
She was very sporting, making sure the guns were spread
awesomely on the floor. Then she struck me a pose.
65
DON’T SHOOT ME!!!
66
Ninjas!!
67
Pirate!
OMG!
Damsel in Distress!
68
This is one cool dude...
69
70
Check out the headsets!
Check out the pants
and boots!
The one on the left should be Yuffie Kisaragi
from the video game Final Fantasy VII.
71
I didn’t do any special effects. That’s an honestto-goodness lightsaber wielded by a Jedi
knight, my friend. Don’t mess with his Force.
72
But wait! There were more cosplayers outside the exhibition hall!
73
Characters from the video
game Final Fantasy XIII.
Cloud Strife, possibly the
most famous character in the
Final Fantasy game series
(he’s from FF VII). This guy got
the spiky hair part right.
In order of their positions: Fang, Lightning, Snow,
Vanille, Hope
74
It’s ok. Just ignore me. I’m just
taking photos with a cute girl.
That’s Tifa (FF VII) on the far left.
A classic pose for Lightning from FF XIII. Ooh, what big sword you have… Her
l’Cie mark is on her chest, so don’t strain your eyes.
Fang from FF XIII. She even got the faded l’Cie mark on the right arm. It’s
faded for a reason. You’ll have to play the game or read about it
somewhere...
75
Hey, get out of the way, Naruto!
Hey, don’t give me
the finger, buster!
Snow from FF XIII. Note
the l’Cie mark on the left
upper arm.
Vanille from FF XIII. She’s
not showing you her l’Cie
mark, because it’s on her
upper left thigh. Don’t be a
pervert...
76
Ok, there’s more coverage of Final Fantasy characters simply because I’m
more familiar with the video game series. And because the lighting
outside of the exhibition hall is better.
The spirit of cosplay is to clothe yourself in the character you’re
portraying as close as possible. You are also to immerse yourself in how
the character would behave, adopting noticeable mannerisms if
applicable. Tattoos (usually fake), weapons (non-lethal of course), props,
clothing, hair (especially colour), stances and poses. I just find these
particular cosplayers more interesting because I know who they’re
portraying.
Hope from FF XIII. His l’Cie
mark is concealed in the
yellow bandana on his left
wrist. His weapon of
choice is the boomerang.
And then I met this bubbly girl...
77
This is Rikku from the
Final Fantasy X-2 version.
Then she turned
nonchalantly to me and
smiled.
“Oi, Yuna! Paine! What do
you think you’re doing with
my knives! I’m gonna kick
you in the spleen!”
78
If you enjoyed this issue of Singularity, feel free to share
the magazine through email, blog or other means. You’re
given the right to print and distribute the magazine
electronically provided you don’t change any of the
content or charge for it.
You can find out more about the magazine at
http://polymathprogrammer.com/singularity/
Send your feedback to
[email protected]
What did you find interesting? What did you find bleh?
This was taken in
Harajuku, Japan, on
the Jingu Bridge
many years ago.
A publication of Polymath Programmer
79

the December 2010 issue

Transcription

Similar documents

summit europe - Singularity University

technological singularity - Amerikanistik

(GIC) Sponsors - Singularity University

the February 2011 issue

The Singularity is Queer

1 - Indico

25-06-2015-Iosif Bena.key

Biological and non-biological nanomachines