how i work.

I appreciate lot of great illustrators that not afraid of showing other how they work, and even give tips and tricks on doing it. It's wonderful for learning from them.

Honestly, I hate some illustrators that act arrogant and meanie with, especially, newbie. I still wondering why, but hey, people have they own personality and reasons so let's skip this thing for now.

Admit it,
we all copying other people's style and drawing at first. Human born and learn to do things by copying other people, and that's natural. Inspired by others are natural and normal.


It's what I call a study.

You copy it, 
you study it, 
you practice it, 
break the elements, 
explore it, 
then put it in your own style 
and develop it even more,
be playful with it,
be creative,
Do not plagiat. Please.


Plagiarism it's different ; it's not a creative and not a smartest things to do.


Truthfully, I believe that I still need lot of training, experiences, and keep on learning. But here I will show you my usual basic steps when i do illustration works.

The steps for every single people are different, It's best we try what's the best for us :


1. Sketching


Manual drawing ; yeah as traditional as it might seems - pencil and paper. I don't know why but doing sketches with tablet still give me a wobbly-sluggish feel, it didn't feel same with the traditional one.

I do a really rough sketches first, tweak it here and there, and usually leave it a while or a day, so i can see if there some error.


*This work like magic, if you do a drawing or maybe other things also - leave it for sometime or day. Sometimes our eyes are too tired or too used to it that we often didn't see any error. That's why it's nice to *give-a-break* to our eyes.


*Other trick to see error ; put your drawing facing the mirror and voila! you can see clearly if there's error or some unbalanced elements like the right ear are bigger than the left one, or the right *boobs* are slightly more bigger than the left...wait, what???

2. Inking


Still manual and traditional way ; with pen and ink. The permanent ink, i find out they mostly are paper friendly- it didn't *blot* the paper and eliminate the OMG-my-line-art-are-damn-ruined expression.

I'm not picky with paper, but i prefer the one that usually smooth texture - it's more easier later for removing the eraser debris.

There is something calming when I do bold-thick line art inking. It give some relaxing feel ; that's why i chose this style as the best for me.

After finalizing inking the line art , the fun part! ; remove all the pencil mark with eraser. Do it gently or it will tear the paper, and make sure the ink are dry already.

3. Scanning

Loud and clear, nuff said :p

4. Coloring


Finally we're going digital!

Tablet is your best friend here ; but for simple coloring I used my normal mouse. Just clean out the line art, pick a color, paint all areas, then after you finish for the first time, take a break again sometime or day. Duplicate - flatten it, adjust the color, and save it for further pleasure,

Done! :D

Upload it and admire your works.

nailart addict.

Much of all my obsessions and addictions i got, this is so far one of the tricky addiction i have. 

It's always hard to do this for my right hand even though i'm quite used to it, i need to wear mask to prevent my nosey-allergy, need time to wait ( for them to dry ) and try not damaging them by touching and doing stuff, and most annoying part is you *accidentally* break them after all your hard work!

Having a cooking hobby are not a good idea pairing with nail art hobby. You tend to break them somehow, most of the time get a cut when chopping foods. House chores also break them even though you already try as careful as you can ( or is it just me :p ).

Thats why now i don't grow my fingernails too long anymore. Actually it's not that bad with short nails ( yes i'm comforting myself, lol ) they can be look sexy also depend on how you make the design.

Here's are some of my nail art that i made this past year, probably i won't have this longer nails again. 

This year christmas design, i love this China Glaze Red-Pumps look on the nail. Too bad my camera can't show too much of the sparkle. In the reality it have more glittery-sparkle looking. I bought this one and fell in love with it ; for my chinese-theme engagement party which suit my red-gold cheong-sam dress.

Kitty design! 

i'm using some gel paint pen for making this. It took some time and hard to apply. I think this was my first time painting something on my nails.

The polkadots design are the most easiest to make and it looks cute, i don't think you will be bored with this design. I'm using the dotting tools, although you can just use any tools you have currently. Just be creative with it :D

So far this is the most *complicated* time-consuming design. But the outcome are satisfying don't you think? 

Mostly, making the gradient effect are annoying, i need to use sponge for it and be patient. I'm trying to make a fresh-lemonade-lemon-ice effect for this one.

While most of the nail lacquer's bottle usually have normal design, this one i think is the most creative from most of all brand ; the Nfu-Oh. They transform the a boring bottle into a women's sexy-bust like :D

This brand have a lot of unique colors. Like the glittering effect for this one can make a *mermaid-scales* effect ( Nfu-Oh 52 ). One of my favorite also, although hard to apply if you didn't use any base color first because of the translucent liquid. Applying this into scale effect might take 4-5 layering for me.