An update on my health...

Trapped in a haze
It all began when I started collapsing randomly.  Shortly after that, the seizures, blackouts, and lapses into unconsciousness regularly came.  I was hospitalized and was diagnosed with "essential epilepsy" because they seriously could not figure out why any of that was happening when no tumors showed up and the ionic balance in my system was very normal. I was also popping 27 (not a typo) pills a day to somehow manage the symptoms, the most potent being Tegretol -- a drug that has a list of side effects as long as my arm.  The rationale behind it all was to basically sedate me because any kind of excitement in my nervous system could trigger seizures.

In that time, I suffered semi-permanent headaches, dizziness, and general weakness.  My friends also noticed that I was turning weirdly bipolar (I still deny this! Hahaha) and would often be confused about what I was doing.  I remember going out to the balcony right in the middle of dinner and my girlfriend asked me what I was doing.  I answered, "I'm going to pee" right before I was promptly dragged back in and led to the bathroom.

After several months of living like this with no discernable progress, it was clearly time for a second opinion.

RIP Michael Turner

I just found out on deviantArt that Michael Turner died of cancer on Friday. Michael Turner was a comic book artist who has worked with the big names in Marvel and DC and also founded his own company, Aspen Comics.

Michael Turner was one of my favorite artists and I first found out about him in an issue of Wizard magazine when he was doing a tutorial on how to draw sex appeal properly. Example: smoking doesn't make a woman sexier, but playing with hair and half closed eyes do.

I even learned how to do the cute triangle nose and full lips on gals from him.

I always loved the covers he made......


He drew the feistiest Starfire (Teen Titans) .....

and the skinniest Supergirl I've ever seen,


I have yet to see anyone else draw Wonder Woman like he does.


He wasn't great with just gals, though.


And he definitely knew how to make a bunch of guys standing around look good.


Thank you very much for all the memories, Mr. Turner. We'll miss you!

--RWHC

**All featured art in this post was drawn by Michael Turner and can be found in the Comic Art Community galleries.

Uncomfortability.

My oh-so-awkward sketchbook pages. Not as pretty as James Jean's (the SVA Illustration posterboy) or one of the old painting masters, unfortunately. I'm trying to get back into the habit of drawing from life, drawing anything in that damned book, which I used to do alot last last year (and was a whole lot better at, I think).

Unfortunately, because I grew up drawing on stray floating bits of A4 paper (thanks to being underexposed to anything art), I don't sit well with these tightly bound books of doom. They tightly close around me, archiving my every move! (like the camera and the yearbook, other archival daemons I try to duck and hide away from as much as possible). The more enjoyable times I've had drawing were on A4 paper, like the pic below:



Eh, screw the sketchbook. Looks like I'm going to be ditching it altogether and just carry sheafs, no... loafs of A4 paper instead. Even at the cost of me looking like a total idiot. Perhaps someday I can get comfortable with it so that I can actually EFFECTIVELY USE those piles of sketchbooks lying around. Let's hope for that.

-Azureon

Design Diary -- Artistic Benchmarks

Most people who know me are probably right in accusing me of being a pack rat, keeping old stuff for nostalgia's sake. Unlike my co-blogger Azureon, I like keeping the old art that I've created. For me, it really helps to see how far I've come and encourages me to keep pushing myself to improve.

Nintendo's Metroid series has always been one of my favorite sources of artistic inspiration because of its imaginative setting and immensely likable heroine. I also tend to draw something Metroid related whenever a new Metroid game comes out.

As I was looking through my art folder, I came across these three drawings that have become my very own artistic benchmarks.

Samus Aran (2004)

Metroid Prime 2: Echoes (2006)

Corruption (2007)

I'm so glad I kept these. I wonder how much will change the next time I update my benchmarks.

--RWHC

Disk Error

There are a few things in life that are as singularly frightening, aggravating, and depressing as losing precious information due to an external hard drive dying. >:[

I still have a lot of reference material as well as projects and games on that thing *sob*

Truth

"There are two means of refuge from the miseries of life: music and cats."

--Albert Schweitzer

Thoughts?

Back From Hiatus

Soooo.. yeah.. This thing was supposed to be more active than the xanga account but unfortunately, my laptop fan broke and it was only recently that I got that fixed. Then, my internet connection got cut, theoretically due to construction work. But I haven't really found out the reason because it just magically reconnected this morning.

In any case, I've got a few things in store for this thing, though it's probably going to be random fanboy rants of what I really enjoy in the creative process of my favorite shows, books, comics, and games. Since.. it's summer and that's pretty much all the material I can think of at the moment :3

A Typical European Joke

Here's something a Greek guy in my class told me:

A guy walks into the doctor's office for a physical. Learning that he's in fine health, the young man asks, " Doc., what can I do to live longer?"

The doctor replied, "Do you smoke?"

"No."

"Do you drink alcohol?"

"No."

"Do you do drugs?"

"Ummm.. of course not!"

"How often do you have sex?"

"Uhhhh.... never."

After taking some notes, the doctor concluded,"You don't drink, smoke, do drugs, or have sex? Why the heck do you want to live longer?"

Reclaiming ICS history

Hey there, ICS and YISS alumni!

As most of you are probably aware by now, the big box containing the photos of ICS history has gone missing. Albert Suh has been trying to kickstart the reclamation of our history by gathering photos from alumni and we -need- your help! If you have any pictures lying around from your days at ICS (especially in the different eras when we were in different buildings such as Pogwang-dong, Youido, Haebangchon, and so on...), please send them in to alumni.guardians@gmail.com

We've got our first batch of pics up here: http://picasaweb.google.com/alumni.guardians/UnsortedICS

Eurovision 2007 Winner

Glad to see a real song win this year. Congrats to Serbia for the song "Molitva"!

Eurovision!

In seven hours, the Eurovision final goes live.

Eurovision's been around for about 50 years, pitting the countries of Europe against each other in a battle of song and dance.

Looking at how big American Idol was in the US and having seen how seriously folks take it, it's refreshing for me to have seen a competition that doesn't take itself waaay too seriously.

After all... where else could a song like this win?