SPEAKERDOG by Ben & Fi

'colours glorious colours' !!!!! The speakerdog character in its little world gives off a happy feeling but its also very random. If I didn't know its name I wouldn't of known it was a dog though haha.


Ben the Illustrator does more projects and collaborations but I like the speakerdog the most ^^. He's even designed his own shoes ranges and caps.

Geo Contact lens: Trend series T-32

I brought these the other day just to have some fun and they look really funny like anime eyes. They have stars on the contacts but it doesn't effect my vision or anything. My character designing style is mainly manga and Im surprised that we can get contacts that are similar to that style.

Seattle: Wall of Gum

Freaking hell! no wayz! this is totally cool but sick at the same time hahaha. Somewhere in Seattle theres this wall...actually its a whole street now full of gum stuck on by many many MANY people!

Colourful....shocking..and also like installation art.

I wonder what it smells like there? anyone know?


I like looking at strange backgrounds for inspiration into colour, perspective and themes.

Tokyo Jeans: Vanquish

Hehehe, Im so happy that I fianlly brought a new pair of jeans. I always like to buy clothes that a rather unusual when it comes to jeans. you can buy these at tokyojeans.co.uk. they're actually mens jeans and I wonder why they dont make them for girls T_T. It was £60 so I thought its worth the money.

In character designing, when creating the costumes I sometimes look into the clothes i have in my wardrobe. So partially my characters reflect some of my life and their appearences are based on what I might wear?

Ninja Cat 0_0

Another search of inspiration for my portfolio of character designing. This cat is really talented. I wish I had a cat like that. look at it's skills :D I need to look at the behaviours of animals depending on what type of character im trying to create.

Nanibird

here's the website nanibird.com

This is where you can download and print out the dotted nets of the model bird. The shape model is the same but there are many different artists and designers collaborating with Nanibird and creating their own versions of it.

Im not very sure but I think its possible to find and download the blank net of nanibird and you can also make your own version possibly?

I like idea of sharing the nanibird. At the same time it gives you the choice of personalizing it so everyone has their own individual nanibird. Its the same but different...

Sneezing Panda

The reaction of the mother panda was sooo funny! priceless moment. I'm trying to look for some ideas for my character design portfolio by searching into animals?

Snacks & Sweets Packaging

Okay, one question. is it about the taste or about the looks that sells a product? The packaging was definatly what made me brought this stuff haha. For this post, Im showing the soda pop candies that I got from the store.


The sweets actually looks like the character on the packaging. Its very faint but the eyes and mouth are printed onto the candy. It would be better if they had more expressions rather just the smily face.
hmmm. I can see their attempt to make the plastic container appear like the shapes of clouds. There's a range of different face expressions on each cloud to show this happy personality.
This was another soda pop candy but it wasn't as eye catching. But you know what? it tasted better ^^. Unlike the cloud candy, this one doesn't shout out as much. The wrapper on the packaging is a lot less and only around the top neck of the plastic container. Interesting choice of bottle shape. It twists slightly...

I would cover more of the container with the wrapper and add more characters otherwise it won't be able to stand out well to sell.

EBISU? the sushi knight?

buwhahahah, I love browsing around the web looking at others work. I was typically on deviant art and I spotted this little guy. I laughed at first but I thought its a really clever concept ^_^. This was drawn by someone called Animaiden but the other details are unkonwn. The colour scheme is similar to shrimps and prawns and the green probabily relates to that wasabi stuff. The word Ebi means prawns so maybe thats how the designer gave this guy the name Ebisu? who knows.

I thought that this artist could of drawn more portraits for this character like more different facial expressions or have various types of costume designs as well. I assume this is the final design but its a shame that I couldn't find the previous ideas and developments.

No Way it looks like...

Outside the town of Leeds there's a new chinese snack shop called 'Asia Express' that opened not long ago so I went to check it out. And I spotted something which looked like this (0.0) !

I was kinda shock but laughing at the same time because its very similar to the character I created for my projects!
Anyways, I ended up buying this chocolate snack for 0.99p (not bad) and I thought the packaging is pretty nice. even the shape of the container looks like a caramel pudding hahaha.
When I opened the container! BAM! I'm surprised when I looked at the chocolate. Its good how the company applied the image of the pudding character onto the shapes of the chocolate itself. This helped me think about not only the designs on the exterior but also considering the insides of products.

TASK2- Where are they? How will they find me?

Its because I'am here to create characters for games or icon mascots, my clients can come from all over but its probabily from games and animation companies. Communication is most likely to do done digitally through e-mail contacts.

To understand my marketing environment, I will use the PEST analysis. For my self run buisness/company for character designing, Technology is what i would be most concerened of.
In politics I would have issues of Copyright licenses and recycling paper waste. I will need to learn about self employment and taxing issues. Its good to start in the UK Leeds because Im more familiar with the laws and trading. In economics not alot is to be thought about since im working from home environments. If i'm selling my character designs to a client overseas then the costs needs to be calculated. I have to become familiar with the exchange rates with the british pound currency. With society in the UK there are many ethics and nationalities. But Im lucky that starting here is most benificial because English is the main language needed for buisness communications. But since im also Chinese I can speak both cantonese and mandarin which is one of the most common languages in the world. In this country there are many people with different interests so its a good place to start my work. Techonolgy is very important and crucial to my buisness, within designing i must keep up to date with the software and using good graphic tablets and computers. The internet is also needed for contacting or recieving commitions and requests from the clients. Being online is fast for communication with the high tech society today as it is forever improving.

Defining my target customers : Segmentaiton

Demographics: Around 16-34 and mainly students or those who like and work with animation and games. Could be for any culture or nationality.

Geographic Factors: Im working from home so transport costs is not much problem but i will have to send products through post. My work is travelled through the internet so the location, climates and city environments is not where i will be competing for buisness.

Psychology: For those who are animators, designers and gamers. Otaku (anime lovers). Students, for those who like cute things.

Behaviour: Its for those who are regular internet users. My work and information will be on the web. My designs will provide by customers a idea and reference for their work. It can be used for their own buisness. For those who buy my illustrations, it can be for self interests, inspiration, display and decorations.

Hat Collector

maybe if you didn't know already... I can go mad for hats and will do anything to buy one if i really like its style. More or less I think I buy a hat almost every week but then I don't get to wear them all. One day my friends mentioned I can actually open a hat shop but then there's no way I'll do that. I go crazy when I see an unusual hat like the ones with a strange style. This way I think that hat is 'RARE' or special. 1 thing I hate is to see another person in town wearing the same hat as me!!!! it can get really annoying!

Hats are great for covering up your greasy hair and make you look good at the same time.

Anyways thats enough about my hat collection. Above is a photo I took earlier but its only about 40% of my collection.

Lomo Camreas: Fisheye No.2

I first learnt about this camera's exsistence from one of my friends facebook photos (shown below). I thought it was just a toy until I was informed that its called a Lomo Camera but this one is a Fisheye edition? I was seriously fascinated and confused at the same time so I looked into it.



The camera is known for its feature 'fisheye barrel distortion' and when I saw these picture samples on the website I was amazed! and understood how the camera got its name from haha.









Overall I love to get one of these gadgets but the downside is that it uses 35mm film.

Panda USB Hand Warmers

I went on www.gadget4all.com and I spotted these 'handy' little things. I might consider purchasing these for the winter. There are times when the room is absolutely freezing and your hands go stiff therefore not being able to type on the keyboard properly. Thank god this was made haha.

Basically, you need to plug it into the USB port and then it will start to warm up. They have other designs like rabbit, bears and even just simple gloves.

Après La Pluie:Emmanuelle Walker

(O_o) I love the designs in Apres la Pluie and I tend to find the lined art sketches more interesting than the fully coloured and finished character images.

The background of the harbors are so beautiful because of the blue sky, under sea life and especially the floating fishes.

Early sketches of the main character. Seems like the only thing similar is the hoody and those scary eyeballs.
Hmm.. everything looks so precised (+_+)
Nice facial expressions. my favourite is probabily the bottom left one. I like to be creating characters and making sketch spreadsheets like these. The benefit of these is that it makes a good portfolio and it helps the development from the first design idea.

BEATS by Dr.Dre

OOOOOH~now this will be going on to my Christmas wish list. What i love about these headphones is that when you order them, you can customize the colour to your own likings! hehehe I wished we got these in college.
These pink ones are limited editions and super rare!!!!!!! only 3 made in the world!

Its great for those who are into modern designs and advance technology and it also attracts people who are into fashion and trends. If only I was rich hahaha, but then i'll have problem deciding on what colour I should choose :P

I started thinking about limited edition products and how it promotes the unlimited ones within the buisness.

Paperchase Food Friends

At work I usually have my own cup for break times but my collegue smashed it the other day. T_T. I was a little sad but I got a chance to go 'cup shopping' or mugs... I went to Debehams, Marks & Spencers, House of Frase, Peter Maturi etc. I started studying some designs and sizes while I was at it. Its interesting that I can find ranges and ranges of different styles and type. Tall ones look more classy where as big fat ones are suitable for containing more liquids.

The images below shows what I ended up with buying hahaha. It kinda suits my personality dont u think? I got to admit its really small but the characters are soooo funny. I found this in Borders *Paperchase*. Shame that there wasn't any bigger sizes. I think this mug was aimed for children therefore the size is rather miniture. Im happy with my new mug though. I got alot of comments from it when I took it to work ^^.


Im interested in designs such as these and applying them onto everyday objects. Its a good way of showing off your work to the mainstream and also a good method of advertising yourself.

Final Custard Sequence

Fear the cute-ness hahahaha. Im happy with the final outcome of this project... its simple but i think it does the job of making people smile :D. It was a pain to find sound effects to suit my character's movements and to make sure i can download them for free T_T. Other than that things have been sailing smoothly for me *thumbs up*

Background music: Min Hyorin

Progress and Milkshake logo

This is a screenshot of the Channel 5 Milkshake website. As shown, it looks colourful, bright and always full of events.

I used photoshop to try imitate the milkshake logo. I will be using this logo in my sequence at the top left corner.

In this screenshot shows how my work is going... it takes a while for me to understand new softwares but i really like how After effects is capable of manipulating and changing still images and adjustments to other media materials.

Title movements animatic.

In the storyboard, i want the text in the sequence to slide into the screen then bounce. Again i used the software pencil to quickly create a animatic.

The previous characters :D

These are the designs that i had in mind before creating the custard pudding character. I looked at images from google and they seem to help me come up with the ideas.

Channel 5 milkshake?

The brief mentioned having Custard shown in the mornings on Channel 5. Usually at that time, the programs are broadcasted by Milkshake. As expected, Milkshake appears in bright, bold colours and the pace of things are fast.

Font Ideas

http://www.1001fonts.com/index.html

I've been looking at some fonts for my CUSTARD logo. I've noticed that Custard sounds more like something for children from ages 3-5+ where as my theme is for an audience in the tweens group (8-12). I'll be sticking to the brief by making the sequence fun and crazy.

Pencilmation by Ross Bollinger

This is quite an inspiration to me and the movements are so smooth when only using basic sketches. He used lined paper as his background to make it feel like its a doodling pad where character are first born into.

Pencil animation :D

The pudding is dancing haha. its better to view it on a LOOP.

Storyboard

hm... this isn't the storyboard for the whole 20 seconds but thats what im thinking at this time. I'll be manipulating the movement of my character and the title (that will be created on illustrator) with the use of Aftereffects.

Custard puddings 2

AH-HAHA! Another development of my character design. Still done on photoshop so maybe i'll do the final design on illustrator!

Custard puddings

Not the final design but when it comes to custard, i first thought of splats and paint. I was hungry when i drew these characters so all i could think of was food.....therefore the custard caramel pudding was born hahhaha. dont forget the cherry :3

A quick flash sequence

not the final logo design but this might be one of the effects i'll be putting into the title sequence. i have to remember my target audience by making it look FUN! and CRAZY.....

Brief ideas and research 1

In this brief im going to produce a title sequence for CUSTARD-Children's Sunday morning show Channel 5.

Zzzap! was one of the programs i've seen when i was in the younger days. I like its crazy-ness and how it looks so busy and interesting. The fonts relates to comics and its usually bold and full of bold colours.

Moleskine sketchbook scans :D

Scans from the spontaneous brain of mines. BAD SPELLING and notes that never make sense. Well at least i know what i jotted down :D its just how i think..

Fresh start eh? and already going through inductions :D

ooooh its been such a boring summer and we only had like 2 weeks of sun throughout the holidays. im glad to be back but still not use to waking up early hahaha.

anyways this is my first time really focusing on the 'After Effects' software since its something ive never came across. i find it rather similar to final cut pro but there's so many things after effects are capable.

This brief will really challenge one of the fields that im usually not good at so hopefully i'll enjoy this.