My good friend Craig recently worked hard to compose a great concept for his video application to Murphy Goode’s “A Really Goode Job” Wine Country Lifestyle Coorespondent position.

To be frank, after watching several video submission, I got the impression that most folks didn’t put as much time and thought into their videos.

PRESENTATION. A lot of the videos have horrible sound quality, or there’s too many visual things happening, making the video seem like an infomercial. Yes, sell yourself, but do it with CLASS! Craig worked hard to ensure that the sound and video quality wouldn’t compromise the presentation of his message.

For a job application where your video is your submission, I’m glad Craig’s is clean, tidy, and went through drafts. You would NOT submit a messy resume for a job, right?

ORIGINALITY + HUMOR. Most of the videos are simply the applicants talking about their experiences, why they should be fit for the job, with a cheesy clip of them sipping some Murphy Goode wine. Since most of the videos are like this, they really lack personality.

Okay, I’m biased, but I honestly think Craig’s video is very different from the other submissions. Even the CURRENT Murphy Goode Lifestyle Coorespondent gave props to Craig’s video and blog post: Andy’s Goode Life Blog - How to Make a Killer Job Application Video.

The best part is that Craig transparently shares his video-making process, and provides an extensive “Murphy-Goode Job Applicants Video Fail Guide” for other applicants to learn from. Craig’s Video Notes + Video Application “FAIL” list.

Do you agree with me, that his video blows the others outta the water?
PLEASE vote for Craig’s video here: http://tr.im/goode by next Friday, June 19th!

The last few weeks, I’ve been living up my childhood nostalgia quite a bit. For the last few projects for my Color Dynamics class, I decided to use classic Nintendo/videogame characters for my assignments.

Assignment: Anomaly and Bridge Tones

Part 1: Create 3-like compositions, using a tightly unified color field. e.g. complementary tones, analogous or monochromatic tones, limited value range.

Part 3: Change two of the existing colors to create bridge tones that will soften the starkness of the anomaly.

I wanted to do something simple, since I had to do 3 iterations of the same composition. What better to do than a tribute to the Super Mushroom?

Here’s what I came up with:

Final Product: Mario Mushrooms

Alllrriiiggght, so I didn’t really follow the assignment! I added a bunch of white to the bridge tones for fear of the mushroom looking too toxic! I changed the golden yellow sun streaks in the background to a yellow-greenish tone (but with LOTS of white), and the mushroom spots from red to a very slight purple (tho it looks blue next to the blue mushroom base color).

I had a LOT of fun working on this project! I might go back and redo the same composition with more popular Mario mushroom colors: the new super mushroom (red base, white spots), the 1-up (neon green base, white spots)

Assignment: Proportional Inventory Study

Part 1: Make a proportional inventory of an image that has an easily countable number of tones.

Part 2: Create a composition of your own using the colors and proportions of the inventory.

This is my FAVORITE piece at the moment!
For Part 1, a few days earlier, I had stumbled upon this image by strongstuff

Optimus Prime Commission by strongstuff

I just thought this Optimus Prime image was AMAZING: blocky style, and minimal colors used to denote the curves and shadows around Optimus’ form. I decided to use this piece for my study.

Here is my Proportional Inventory, breaking down the proportions of how many colors there are in the Optimus Prime piece, and also how MUCH of it exists in the piece all together. (Ex: 20% white, 5% light gray, etc.)

NOTE: Depending on your computer monitor’s settings, the colors might not match. My desktop monitor’s colors are all kinds of whack so I used to my new laptop to view the Optimus Prime pic. From there, I spent a while mixing the colors on my palette until it matched closely the colors on my laptop screen.

Then came the fun part!! I needed to figure out what Nintendo character was mostly blue and red… At first thought, of course I thought of Mario! But I had a few problems: Mario is mostly red with blue overalls, plus he has skin tones, which was not part of the Optimus Prime color inventory! I texted Norvelle, Brent, and Greg in class and we came up with a few options: Mario, Yoshis, Sonic(!!). As much as I wanted to do a piece on Sonic <3 <3 <3, I realized that I could do something with Megaman. Megaman has very minimal skin so it would be a nice experiment!

But what could off-set Megaman’s mostly blue body with red?

Here’s what I came up with ;)

Final product: Megaman+Protoman

Protoman’s red base served as a perfect balance for Megaman’s blue. Being Megaman’s brother, I found it appropriate to do a split down the middle between the two. The ultimate battle between Good and Evil!

Result? Bubbling New Ideas For Future Pieces!

After I started taking on the assignments with subjects that were more of my style (illustrations, more graphic/character-based), I concentrated and spent more time working on my pieces. I noticed that I enjoyed it x100 more doing fan art! Soooo…

My new project will be to create a series of classic videogame fan art!

Have any ideas or requests? Please comment and let me know what characters or game you would like to see!

Oh, and if I’m not already familiar with the game, I promise to play it to learn the ridiculous intricacies of it. (ex: Ninja Gaiden’s CHEATER birds. BULL.SHIT.)

Follow your dreams.

We’ve all heard it since the day we were born. I’ve said it before and I’ll say it again: As children, we’re asked the grand question, “What do you want to be when you grow up?” From that moment on, we’re taught the idea that we can do ANY and EVERYthing that we want, so long as we want it and work hard enough. I long realized that these ideas and dreams usually dissipate by the time we reach our adult lives.

I mean, don’t get me wrong. I know a handful of people that knew EXACTLY what they’ve wanted to be since childhood, and they’ve worked hard from day one to achieve it. To name a few: Steven H, Sarah, Cotroneo. They’ve always had their vision on their dreams, and they stuck to it.

This is something I highly respect and highly admire, mostly because this comes so rarely in the lives that I know. It also hits home in my own life, reflecting how long it’s taken me to pursue my own dreams.

Contine Reading More… »

As mentioned in some of my previous posts, I’ve been taking a class called Color Dynamics at Laney College in Oakland.

This class is led by Anna Vaughn, and focuses on the interaction of color as developed by Josef Albers. The studies that we’ve experimented with, learned from, and gained immense knowledge from are skills and techniques that I’ve really come to value.

I have to say that I’ve missed out on a lot, not knowing or understanding, or even being comfortable with color!  Only a few months ago, I was the person that said: “Wooowww! It’s SUCH a nice day out! ….. I think I’ll wear GRAY!” (Okay, I admit that it was only a few weeks ago, and I actually still really love my plain black, white, and gray colored clothes.)

Nevertheless, this class has taught me a lot about how to utilize color in my art pieces, which was always a challenge for me in the past without any formal training. Ever spend weeks on an awesome outline drawing, only to mess it up when you plop down some color you realize doesn’t work at all? Yeah, that was me. This class has taught me a lot about how to use and how to MAKE colors work to enhance your composition, and how to create the feel and mood of your piece.

But I think the greatest lesson this class has taught me is how to be COMFORTABLE with color. Now, even if I “mess up” and use a color I wasn’t originally intending, I’m not afraid to experiment and explore different mixtures to create a completely different composition than expected.

Below are several lessons I’ve learned that I’d like to share with you, along with the works I created to complete these experiments. I’m proud of my pieces, and I hope you enjoy them too!

Make One Color Appear As Two

This was one of our first lessons that shocks me even now! For me, this was the phenomenon that got me fascinated about our perception and understanding of color, and how much it exists in our everyday world (yet we know so little about)!

The exercise is to make one color look like two completely different colors. This is done by changing the background colors. Here’s an example:

Assignment: Make one color appear as two different colors (by changing the background colors)

Notice the small, olive-green square in the middle of these two bigger green and blue squares. Because of the contrast in hue, value, and saturation of the green and blue background squares, it makes the smaller, olive-green squares look like two different colors.

(Don’t trust me? If you’re using Firefox, download the Colorzilla plugin and use the eyedropper to see if the colors are the same.)

Isn’t that AWESOME!?

Transparency

The illusion of transparency was a very fun project for me! Maybe it’s the challenge of having detailed, precise lines and borders in order to successfully create the illusion, or maybe it’s just because it looks so cool!

The illusion of transparency is created by slightly altering the tone of your colors to make it appear like there’s a transparent sheet (like a photo gel) on top. Here’s what I did:

The Illusion of Transparency (03-26-09)

I first laid down the main brighter yellow ochre and purple, then laid down the darker yellow ochre and darker purple tones (the circlular and triangular dark shades).

For the gouache paints that we’re using, it’s really important to lay down each tone separately. Otherwise, the color/tone on the bottom might come up and the illusion won’t work. Each have to be laid down separately, and you have to make sure the lines and borders are precise in matching up.

I also learned the illusion of transparency and space. That is, creating the illusion of a transparency behind or in front of an object. Here, I created an illusion of a red ribbon flowing behind and in front of a few white transparent lines:

The Illusion of Transparency and Space (03-26-09)

To create this illusion, follow the same technique as the above Illusion of Transparency exercise: lay down each tone separately, and make sure your lines are precise.

Additionally, to make the ribbon look like it’s flowing BEHIND the white transparent lines, mix the two together and add a little more of the foreground object’s color. So, I mixed red and white (making a pinkish color), and added a little more WHITE since that’s in front.

Similarly, to make the ribbon look like it’s flowing IN FRONT of the white transparent lines, mix the two together and add a little more of the foreground object’s color. So, I mixed the red and white, and added a little more of the RED since the ribbon is in front of the white.

Pretty simple, eh? :)

Developing a Palette

Here’s another fun project I’ve really enjoyed: Create 3 pieces with the same composition, and use different reds, yellows, blues for each one. (For any greens, purples, oranges that you use for each piece, you must mix the primaries that you’ve chosen to use for that piece to create those greens, purples, oranges, etc).

Ready, Set, Go -- 3 Primaries Palette (04-27-09)

Left: I used yellow ochre, crimson red, ultramarine blue
Middle: Lemon yellow, brilliant red, gray
Right: Medium yellow, burnt sienna, sky blue

Each piece is 3×4 inches and was very fun to patiently work in all the details, and slight shading. I had no idea that the colors would come out so differently for each piece, so it was definitely a great surprise! Each came out very special and unique in its own way.

Which one do you like more? I’m drawn towards the middle one the most!

Altering Palette

I just completed this today! Create 2 pieces with the same composition. Paint the first piece normally. For the second piece, use an additive color for each color used. The result will make the colors in the piece look more unified.

The additive color I used was a blueish gray.

Boxer (04-29-09)

Teehee! Isn’t my boxer guy cute? I couldn’t stop giggling when I was painting this!

Have any feedback about any of these pieces? Let me know what you think!
Want to see more of my previous work? Feel free to visit my Portfolio!

Thanks, Brent (@brentium), for the heads up about this!

A bunch of Union International food spices have been recalled. A lot of Asian restaurants use these spices. This has apparently been happening since mid-March but I haven’t even heard about it until today.

From SeriousEats.com:

The state health department has issued a consumer alert warning about spices used by Asian restaurants manufactured by a Bay Area plant that have been linked to a Salmonella outbreak in Central and Northern California. So far, 42 people in the nation have gotten sick, including 33 in California, according to the California Department of Public Health. Illnesses have occurred in 15 counties in Central and Northern California, the most recent being March 13.

“Consumers should avoid eating spices manufactured by Union International Food Company,” the agency’s director Dr. Mark Horton said on the department’s Web site.

According to the health department, health specialists have linked the Salmonella cases to the plant’s white and black pepper products used in Asian restaurants.

Here’s the rest of the SeriousEats.com article, and some other helpful links:

• http://www.seriouseats.com/talk/2009/03/bay-area-spice-plant-linked-to-salmonella-outbreak.html
• http://www.cdph.ca.gov/HealthInfo/news/Pages/PH09-022.aspx
• http://www.cdph.ca.gov/HealthInfo/news/Pages/PH09-021%20%20Union%20Int%20Spice%203.28.09.aspx
• http://www.cdph.ca.gov/HealthInfo/news/Pages/NR2009-23-WidenedRecallofSpices.aspx

Salmonella Restaurant Black List (PDF) — Here is a list of local Bay Area restaurants that receive shipments from Union International.

A lot of these are popular Asian restaurants that many of my peers go to. And… well… knowing the standards of some asian restaurants, they might ignore the illness warnings. Better not risk it, imo!

Spread the word!