HEY HEY HEY!! This past semester I got a chance to work on an illustrative story book for a publication class which was super exciting and scary at the same time! Believe me when I say I don't draw and have never really painted digitally like this before, but God has shown me His goodness and faithfulness throughout this process, I have a smile on my face thinking back at all the late nights, the struggles, the hardships, the surprises, the patiences, encouragement and support I have experienced through the making of this project. it's come a long way, still a working progress and I STILL FOUND SPELLING MISTAKESSSSS... Believe it or not, the concept actually started a year and a half ago, during my first class (Visualisation Illustration) in the MFA program. Back then, I spent the semester developing a basic storyboard, character, was planning to make an animation and even did 3D models for the project, but I ended up not making the animation and finished the class with a basic concept on this concept of emptiness. I have mentioned this before, I haven't really done much artistically before coming to the MFA program so seeing the difference from the first initial storyboard (first semester in the program) to the finished project shows how great of a God I serve. It's not about me and not in my ability or strength, if God calls you to do something, just go and do it, cause HE will surprise you, HE will give you the ability, just have a willing heart! Here are the initial sketches from that class =P
Hollow started when I was asked to solve a problem with a visual solution... Coming from Macau China, the "problem" that I settled on was the issue of emptiness. Macau is the gambling capital of the world, materialism, chasing a better life, and in search of "happiness" are things I grew up being surrounded by. Thankfully, growing up in a Christian home, I got to know Jesus Christ as my personal saviour and found true fulfilment and joy in Christ. But many are living that life style of searching for the next "high", and it's draining, it's tiring and it's never ending... My mom always illustrated emptiness like this: We all have a hollow space in our hearts that only God can fill up, and when we put other things in this hole, they fall out, we might be "happy" during the brief moment it's going through, but it falls out. However, once Jesus fills that hollow space, I not longer depend on these "other things" to bring me joy, once I have Jesus, everything else is an added blessing, but I'm already whole. So God used the visualisation illustration class to develop a basic concept, a direction for Hollow.
Ok,,, so this semester, I took a publication class and between my three initial ideas of "the history of gum", "the journey of the heart" and "hollow", I've decided to use the class to continue on this concept of emptiness and decided to do an full on illustrative book, which was a crazy idea. In 4 months, I had to have a good story that depicts the concept of emptiness in an engaging yet simple way and then have to somehow illustrate and print out an actual book?? I still remember proposing the plan to the class and saying "I'm going to die", but once again, this project is not about me, God was working a year and a half ago, I am still in awe looking at the pages. All I knew going into the project was that blue was the main color and the character has a puppet element to it. Story development took longer than expected which gave me only a month to work on digital painting the pages. I got to meet with professors and friends who challenged my storyline, "why is this here?", "what does this mean?", "is the theology correct?". During this process, I had changed the story 4 times and the pages went from 32pages --> 60 pages --> 36 pages, and the text style went from a first person reaction style to a narrative style. My professor challenged me to create four variations per scene which was incredibly helpful adding depth to the scenes and story being told. There were so many difficult moment in which I honestly wanted to give up, when I struggled with drawing and story development, and I have tried to squeeze content out but It doesn't work, many times God will show up last minute when I finally once again come back in humility and admit that I can't do this on my own. I also have to thank all my friends who took time looking over my dummy books, giving me feedback and suggestions and checking for grammar and spelling mistakes, I am beyond thankful for everyone involved in the process!
After finalising on the context of the story, painting it was the next big challenge, how detail should the textures be? how do you control the lighting? what colours to use? how are the colours going to translate when printed? where do you start? how do you start? yes... I really didn't know. But start somewhere, I started with the first two pages and then redoing them for a few time before finding a color scheme?? that fits the emptiness vibe. It took close to two weeks figuring out what colors I should use and how to keep the few pages I was working on consistent throughout, I wanted to give up, at this point I have 2 weeks left to finish 13 pages and I wanted to change the more cinematic style to a simple line art cause I couldn't see myself finishing everything in the given time. But my classmates and professors encouraged and pushed me to continue with the more cinematic style. They also made it clear that I don't have to illustrate every single detail of what is happening, let the context and the readers imagination do the connecting work, that was a lesson I had to learn coming from an animating mindset of this leads to that. So in the end everything was finished in time, I have grow and learn so so so so so much during this process, so humbled by the finished product, and can't wait to see how God might use it, if possible even have it translated into different languages and animated?? I don't know, would want to eventually keep working on it or at least make small detailed adjustments before making it public and publishing it. God is good!! thanks for making it through this incredulity LONGGGG blog and being on this journey with me =]
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HEY, HEY, HEY,, I'm back in my lovely little space in the land I was born, Macau China, still in awe of the fact that I actually lived in America this past year, and took on a field I had never even dreamed of having any connection with.....
One year passes so fast if you're not paying attention, but at the same time, so so so so so much can happen within a year. For me, I don't even know where to begin with, from the first awkward "Hi, I'm heather from Macau"?? The challenges and trials that came along the way?? The battles acknowledged and overcame?? The friendships built?? The scary steps of saying "Yes" and opening up?? hahaha,, like I said, much as happened, and maybe, just maybe ;P one day I'll share them with you, But one thing I've definitely learnt throughout this year, one thing that God has constantly been teaching me is that "I'm honestly not that special" hahah,, ok, before you hate on me, hear me out =] Guys, when God calls you to do something or go somewhere, what's your respond? How much time would you need to think? How many times do we say "no, I'm not good enough"?? God switched my path from Communications to Digital Art. Being in America?? Pursing a Master of Fine Arts?? The highest degree in the Art field?? How crazy is that?! But that was exactly what I've been doing this past year... and let me tell you, it's INTIMIDATING sitting in a classroom where everyone has been at least 4 years down the road in this "art" journey, and that is "AT LEAST". Still remember walking up to my digital painting professor the first day of class as he pointed at me and said, "here's my special case" LOL And yes, I had days of wondering whether or not I'm good enough,, was I crazy for coming and taking this step,, and getting art "basic" in a Master's program?? But as these thoughts creeps in, God met me where I was. Throughout this whole year, one huge theme that God continually brought up was :"this is not about you, stop looking at yourself and fix you eyes on me", and let. me. tell. you. that GOD . IS . PATIENT . when he spends 6 months constantly pouring His word over me on this one theme. He took His time and started me off with the book of Esther, I've mentioned this before in my post "If I Hadn't Fail 5th Grade" but I'll bring it up again, cause it's how it started =P "For if you remain completely silent at this time, relief and deliverance will arise for the Jews from another place, but you and your father’s house will perish. Yet who knows whether you have come to the kingdom for such a time as this?” - Esther 4 : 14 - It is a privilege to work along side God, when He calls and invites you to be apart of His plans, don't think tooo highly of yourselves, it's actually humbling to know that God doesn't "need" to use you, if you say "No", He can just ask and ARISE someone else! You are not that special. But then you'll miss out on the adventure/blessings that comes along aside with God's calling =] Ok now, let's say you answered God's call, which I honestly courage you to! If he is calling you to do something or go somewhere, JUST DO IT! So often we start to fear after answering God's calling, fear of not being fit for the job, fear of messing up, fear of what other people think..... But remember, where God guides, He provides. Esther had to go into a 12 month training before even stepping foot in the task God has called her to do!! (Esther 2:12) God took the time to train and prepare her for the job He had called her to do. God is equipping you/me right now! I honestly don't have a clear picture of what I'll be doing exactly? but God knows and am equipping me accordingly. But then it's SO easy for us to start looking around and comparing with those around us and eventually lose sight of who God is in our life and putting our emphasis on the skills we (think we) have. I've been there, and it's draining!! Isaiah 22 : 8 & 11 says this, ".......You looked in that day to the armor of the House of the Forest........But you did not look to its Maker........ " In a worldly mindset, if you're going to war, your confidence is probably placed on the level & amount of weapons you possess; if you are taking on a job, your confidence is placed on the skills and tools you possess. But when we live a surrendered life to the Lord, where should we put our confidences? where should we fix our eyes on? That verse states it so well, they did not look to its Maker, but I pray that you do. Last verse,,,, have you read the Bible and just start laughing and mumble the words, "God you are funny"?? I have, many times hahah =] I read this verse and ran out to tell my sister!! "A highway shall be there, and a road, And it shall be called the Highway of Holiness. The unclean shall not pass over it, But it shall be for others. Whoever walks the road, although a fool, Shall not go astray." -Isaiah 35 : 8- The people walking on this highway are cleansed by the blood of Christ, so if you accept Christ as your saviour and confesses your sins, you are one of those who can pass and walk on this Highway of Holiness =] Ok now when that has gone through your head, check this out "Whoever walks the road, although a FOOL, shall not go astray" this was so funny to me cause in a way it's SO true lol, I'm one of those walking on this road, but I'm a FOOL, I'm CRAZY, I'm WEIRD, I don't know what I am doing, AND IT IS OK!! cause I "shall not go astray"! and you ask why? Cause God is leading me each step of the way. So when the world calls you crazy for doing something God has placed in your heart, fix your eyes on God, fix your eyes on the MAKER and don't look at the "armour" in your house!! =D Hey Hey Hey. For the past month I've been working on a new animation on how Chinese Characters can be used to help us understand biblical truths and stories. This was a "Teach Me" project from a class I'm taking and it's also my first animation that's in and about Chinese!! [exciting, haha] So when God gave me the idea and I started doing some research on the topic, many Chinese scholars criticise Christians who "try" to separate Chinese Characters and force meanings from the ancient characters, just stating it out because that is not what this video is about. I wanted to use this video to show kids how biblical concepts and truths can be seen through their everyday Chinese characters =D another reason that really motived me to settle on this topic is that all the videos I've found explaining this topic are very academic and educational and not really "fun" in a sense. So that's a little background on why I made this video =] So for this video, I focused on three Chinese characters: 船(boat), 塔(tower), 義(righteous). For the word "boat", you can separate it and see it as 舟(ark), 八(eight) & 口(mouth), which is fascinating, cause kids can look at it and easily remember that the first boat the bible ever mentioned was the Noah's ark and that there were eight people in it. For the word "tower", you can separate and see it as 土(mud), 艹(grass) & 合(unity), which is also fascinating [hahahha] that a group of people united under one language and used sticks and mud to build the tower of Babel. For the word "righteous", this is the most fascinating to me, where you can literally see the love of God through this character, the character can be separated and seen as 羊(sheep) & 我(me), and it's the sheep on top of me!! How that concept of being made righteous by the lamp of God covering us can be easily understood by kids in this sense?! it's amazing even as I'm typing this out! =P Here's the story line . . .. So the animation is about this fluff!! again,, haha. But the story starts with "Wings, are missing..." and "Mission, discover biblical mysteries through Chinese characters". Fluff will gain wings as it reaches each part of the character and gain extra when the bible verse comes up after every word. But for the word "tower", fluff loses all it's wings when the bible verse comes up because that action for building the tower of Babel was not pleasing to the Lord =[ BUT!!! in the end, because we were made righteous through Jesus, the perfect lamb of God, fluff gains ALL it's wings back!!! the end. The verse I used . . . For "boat", 1 Peter 3:20, ". . . once the longsuffering of God waited in the days of Noah, while the ark was a preparing, wherein few, that is, eight souls were saved by water." For "tower", Genesis 11:1&4, "Now the whole earth had one language and one speech. . . And they said, 'Come, let us build ourselves a city, and a tower whose top is in the heavens; let us make a name for ourselves, lest we be scattered abroad over the face of the whole earth.' " For "righteous", Genesis 22:8 "My son, God will provide for Himself the lamb for a burnt offering" 2 Corinthians 5:21 "For He made Him who knew no sin to be sin for us, that we might become the righteousness of God in Him." Funny thing before you watch the video, I just realised today how God lead the process for choosing the specific characters and the order they were placed in the video. How the first one was "boat" and about how God saved Noah's family from the flood, introducing the mercy of our Father. The second one was "tower", how humans decided to be bigger than their creator. The third one was "righteous", how it's really not about what we do that saves us, but purity on who God is. We are DEAD-MEAT by ourselves, but were made righteous by the grace of God =D ** BIG Shout Out to Sammy Tang!!! Who wrote all the Chinese you see in the video ** Behind the scenes . . .
I'm not artistic, I was known as the althete at home, my mom always told me that I have terrible handwriting, and she's right, my handwriting is unbelievable! =P So why am I studying graphic design?? In my final year of high school, I accidentally took on a job for my best friend to make a video about an historical building at school, I didn't know anything about video editing, that was my first time ever trying. and I learnt how to use IMOIVE!! YEAH!!
During that time, "something" was stirring in my heart to re-do our church's website and make posters for church events, now this is all new for me and I could have easily said "oh, that's a stupid idea" and just left it as that. But I went ahead and tried it. I started watching YouTube tutorials on Photoshop, Illustrator and coding, and after a year, I redid the church's website with Dreamweaver and got to do posters for church. Designing was hard. You need CREATIVITY & TECHNICAL skills!! As an athlete and a beginner, I lacked both . . . But how could you grow if you lack perseverance? That "thing" stirring in my heart grew by the day. I knew strongly in my heart that serving the Lord is not about how good you are in certain areas but whether you have a willing heart or not. It's NEVER about YOU!! it's about Him and His glory. ". . . Not by might, nor by power, but by my spirit, saith the Lord of hosts." Zechariah 4 : 6 Therefore I continued in my search for tutorials, and held on to any opportunity to practice my skills . . . The University I was had a few but not a lot of digital art classes, however, I had the opportunity to go on an exchange semester at the George Washington University (GWU) in my junior year and I was so excited and took all "art" classes, frame by frame animation, motion graphics, web production and even a sculpture class. It probably wasn't the smartest discussion taking all these creative art classes all at once cause each class made us do around 3 big projects and the due dates crashed every time!! But it was during this environment where I have to constantly come up with creative ideas that I've realised --- creative art, animation and design --- is what I really have a passion for. During that summer, I heard about the Bible project and the ministry they have, and in my heart I knew that God's calling me to serve Him with digital art. And that's why I'm going to Liberty for a Graphic Design Master Programme, seriously, I'm scared cause I don't know what to expect and how big the challenges will be or if I'll be able to make it or not, but I know that God is bringing me there so I can grow and learn in areas where I lack, it's actually really easy to start comparing with my classmates, cause many of them are really good. But no, we are all there to be equipped and grow to where God is leading us personally. And that is my long story (super) short, below will be work I've done and short descriptions to help you understand my progress in art and design =] by the way, I've mention I redid the church's website with dreamweaver, well, just a week ago, I've relaunched the website and this time, it was made with WordPress.org, again another story of how God stirred and taught, here's the link, just in case your curious =P
I find myself always over complicating projects, and to my surprise, in GWU, people in the same class as me were mostly digital art majors and had prior experience compared with me, however, professors were somehow really impress with my work, I can only understand it as the grace of GOD =] cause I know I'm not creative at all without Him =P
During my final year of university in Macua, I was able to take the only few digital classes we had and had these...
My most recent work, which is also my favourite piece, was a 3D Blender project, and no surprise, this was also my first try to use the software and to make a 3D animation, this piece was inspired by the story of "the garden of Eden" from the Bible and "the last battle" from Chronicles of Narnia. "Fluff" was a little guy I drew on a piece of scrap paper after I've finished my maths exam revision in 9th grade. I loved it and started including it in letters, signatures. so when my animation class had us make a short animation, I was like "Why not make a story about fluff?". **interesting fact, it took 5 days rendering on 28 computers for this little guy to come to life, the quality is not as good as I've hoped and you'll see lots of flaws in the video, but in the time that I had, this was the best I could have done, so I'm happy =D Being a new MFA student in Liberty is going to be challenging, especially when design classes in general are new to me. Don’t know what to expect or whether I’ll be able to meet professors standards and keep up with my classmates. Challenges are fundamental for growth, therefore I’m excited to learn and explore areas I have never even though about. I don’t exactly know where God is leading me with creative art and design, however, seeing how He completely changed my path a few years ago showed me clearly that I am just a tool willing to be used by the Creator =] |