Live Long & Prosper

I consider myself a Star Trek fan. I'm an original series fan. Spock's my favorite, because of the inner turmoil he has with being half Vulcan and half Human. He constantly struggles with how to purge himself of all emotion and think and act with only logic. Just talking about him makes me want to watch the original series again. I'm a nerd. I know.

Daddy, Why Did You Eat My Fries

I watch Adventure Time with my roommates a lot. I was bored today, so I thought why not give them a painting of Marceline singing our favorite song?

Chillin'

I believe that this is a sketch of a close up of a character in Do the Right Thing (Dir. by Spike Lee). I absolutely adore that film. Spike Lee is a genius. The character is Pino, played by John Turturro. I think I sketched this back in my freshman year of college, when I was taking an Intro to Film class and was required to write a paper on Do the Right Thing, so I ended up sketching while I was rewatching it. I traced over it over the summer because I was worried about the pencil fading, so now there's a bit too much boldness around the edges.

Dear Hater

My school recently had a chain of hate crimes on campus. As an African-American, I guess I was affected more than the majority of my friends. Mostly this was to collect my thoughts and say what I wanted to say to the person/people involved in these crimes.

Searching for the Real

This sketch is more about my look on the world and people. I'm of the opinion that there are few real things in this world. People come and go out of people's lives, and some are genuine and some aren't. Some people become life long friends, some people don't. Some people are truly beautiful, regardless of their physical appearance. My goal in life is to reach that kind of inner beauty. I want to be a genuine person in that sense.

Welcome to the Dollhouse

I made this over the summer. It's another film scene, this time from the movie Welcome to the Dollhouse (Dir. by Todd Solondz). The film is considered a cult classic, about a 7th grade girl who is mostly ignored by people and treated like crap. It's definitely a dark comedy, but has both funny and sad moments. This scene is when this boy that mostly bullies her actually shares a moment with her because they are both in the same place, and realize they have a lot more in common than they thought.

Achieving Singuarity

This is a journal entry from October 8, 2010. It was written last year during my sophomore year at MSU. I was feeling pretty isocolated, and very lost. I didn't feel like anyone really knew me and that I was just playing roles in other people's lives. I took the journal entry and picked some of the parts that hit with me most, and added a recent picture of me that I messed with in Photoshop. I painted the background.

Justification

 Sorry again for the absence. I had to get a new scanner, and to be honest, I don't like it as much as my old one. Date on this is August 2, 201l. My thoughts were on religion and also just the meaning of life. I think we spend so much of our lives trying to figure out why we're here, when we should focus more on what we're gonna do. The obsession with how we were created is always so odd to me. Because who cares how we got here? Obviously we were given life for a reason, so why not live it to the fullest instead of constantly looking for answers. I don't mean to offend anyone, because if religion is working for you, more power to you. I'm not an atheist either. I guess I just believe in believing.

Liars

Anger has never really been something that I've been good at expressing or feeling. I usually try and shrug it off. But this time I was just sick of listening to so many people lie to me. And the amount of people recently has been kind of ridiculous. Guess I just thought people were more honest about stuff. We all are what we want people to see I've realized. I'm just the idiot who believes them. People always tell me I have this problem with making excuses for people and not being able to confront people because I worry about how the other person is going to take it. I guess my sketchbook is the place I have to confront people, even if they never see it. I made this sketch in Jhonen Vasquez's style, and it is pretty dark in the same way as his art.

Waste

So I haven't posted a lyrical sketch in a while. This has been one of my favorite songs recently, "Waste" by Foster the People. Basically, it's just about being there for someone you love. My interpretation of the song has been that he's taking care of someone who's going through a mental breakdown, or has mental issues. This song is pretty much solidified my obsession with Foster the People. The sketch somehow ended up with a red and blue theme, and with some of the empty white, it kinda has patriotic colors. I didn't mean to do that, but I don't think it's the first thing that comes to mind when you look at it.

Voices of My Cranium

Alright, so this is a collage-ish piece. People always wonder what's going on in my head when I go silent or when I suddenly start talking to myself (and yes, I do this often), so here it is. More dark than the way I act. Mostly it contains what most art contains: A lot of self-hatred. haha Hope this isn't to emo for you readers out there. Did this one about a week ago at night.

Hope Never Dies

Hello all, sorry that I have left you hanging! I've been making so many trips with friends and hanging out that I guess this took a backseat to everything else. So this sketch I drew about two weeks ago I think. It was after I watched an episode of Skins. I wanted to capture that feeling one gets when you're alone, and you feel like maybe you're never gonna find happiness because you don't know where you're going in life. But I also wanted to have some type of graffiti that said "Hope never dies" because I believe that as long as you believe in that, you'll find the right path.

Eternal Sunshine

Lately, my sketchbook hasn't been touched. I guess I'm just gonna upload another film scene sketch. This was made at the end of June. This one is from Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind. Fair warning-- this doesn't look like the actors who play in the film, but I still like it for the cartoon-like look of it.

Doll

This from the '05 sketchbook. Not one of my better sketches, but this sketchbook was when I just started out. The girl is a doll from a manga called God Child by Kaori Yuki. This from the "A Little Crooked House" story arc. If anyone looks up the picture that I sketched this from, you will see I definitely messed it up. It's still kinda cool though, I guess.

Possible Graphic Novel?

Sorry about the hiatus, been busy for the past few days, really haven't done much in my sketchbook or been near a scanner. I'm gonna post some old stuff probably for the next couple of days and look through my current sketchbook to see what I'm okay with posting.
Anyways, this is two of the three main characters for my graphic novel idea, Hunter Stanton & Alexander Portman (I posted some practice sketches of him earlier). I haven't been working on it much. This is from a month ago I think, I was trying to practice large scale drawings of them. The eyes on Hunter got all blotched, my bad. The graphic novel revolves around a possible apocaplyse, which the agents of heaven and hell know depends on a drug addict named Alexander Portman.

Childhood Cartoons

I was feeling nostalgic a couple nights ago, and started drawing some old cartoons I liked back in the day. Hey Arnold!, As Told by Ginger, Rocket Power, Recess, Lloyd in Space... I miss those Saturdays when I used to get up and make sure to change the channel to ABC so I could watch One Saturday Morning, or the days after school that I'd switch on Nickelodeon and watch hours upon hours of cartoons. Ah, well, those days are behind me. Doesn't stop me from watching them all on Youtube.

Sometimes.

So here's some thoughts I wrote just a couple days ago. I was thinking about my next upcoming semester, and how once again, I'm going to be the only one who's a little different. When I say "different," I'm not just talking about the fact that I'm on the crazy side, although I suppose that's part of it. But everything that is part of my identity seems to differ from everyone I'm living with. I'll be the only minority, the only one who doesn't really party, the only one who isn't having sex with someone, the only one with the history I have, the only one who has connections to the ghetto... The only one who isn't the typical "average" college girl. That's not to say I don't totally love my roommates--- I chose them for a reason. But sometimes it's a very isolating feeling; knowing that as much as you try to explain who you are to people, they constantly want a "why."

Quais de Seine

So this is another film scene. I guess I'm going through a phase in my sketchbook where I'm sketching film scenes with my favorite lines. This is from "Paris, Je T'Aime," which is a film that consists of 18 shorts by various directors all over the world. One of my favorite shorts in the film is "Quais de Seine," by Gurinder Chadha. As you can probably guess, most of the shorts are in French, but I have the film with English subtitles, so I put those in my sketch.

Change

So here's something in my sketchbook that I worked on last week. It's a painting of Dan Dunne, a character from the film "Half Nelson," which is one of my favorites. The film is about a middle school teacher who is addicted to coke, and one of his students becomes caught up in dealing it. It's a odd movie because of the father-like role the main character plays to the student, yet accepts coke from her also. It was written and directed by Ryan Fleck. It's yet another movie I recommend you see. But with the painting I added one of my favorite lines from the film.

Video Projects

So this isn't really film directly from the creative side of my cranium, but I've been so busy lately I really haven't had the time to paint or sketch or look through my sketchbooks to put something up. Also, I do not have my scanner with me right now. So here's two of my film projects for my journalism class.

Okay?

So I wrote this on June 1st, 2011. I have a very complicated relationship with someone who's very important to me. A lot of people who are close to me can probably guess who it is about, but I'm not about to disclose that. This person has some social problems, and I try my best to help them when I can. But I also try to live my own life and do my thing, which sometimes upsets this person and makes them think I don't care about them. Sometimes this person tells me I'm a bad person and that I only care about myself.... It's just bad sometimes, and it's hard to tell whether what they are saying is true or not. Anyways, it's a poem.

Azmi

So I decided to post one of my life style sketches. I did this earlier last week, while I was kinda on a life style rampage. I started looking at friends' facebook pictures and trying to sketch them. Anyway, one of my friends, Azmi was bugging me about drawing him riding on a horse like some freakin' Clint Eastwood movie... so I just thought I would try sketching him first to see if I could get the image right. I'm not sure... I can't decide whether I got it right or not. I seem to be caught between the cartoon and life style on this one. Either way, hopefully Azmi doesn't mind that I posted this (hey Az, let me know what you think lol)

Says It All

Lately I find more comfort in silence with people than with all the talking. It's nice to just sit and occasionally say a few words with a person, and not feel like you're having the same conversations over and over again. I find myself wanting more alone time, without so much hustle and bustle and constant noise. I drew this using characters from Hot Gimmick, a manga I used to read back in the day. (I told you, I've been revisiting my comic/manga phase a bit) I've been trying to gain confidence in using pens with my sketches more.

Johnny "Nny" C.

So I went through a life style sketching phase for half of last week, and then I switched over to graphic novel style. I started revisiting some of my old favorite comics....one of which, is "Johnny the Homicidal Maniac" by Jhonen Vasquez. I don't know if any of you out there have read this comic, but I myself feel that it was little inappropriate for my age at the time I was reading it (13, to be exact). It's about this guy who is mentally ill and murders people and paints this one wall of his house with their blood to stop the "impending negative energy" from getting out and destroying everything. It's actually really funny now that I've been reading over some of the issues, and I get the humor a lot more than I did back then. I especially love the scenes with Johnny and Squee. But my favorite issue was #6, where Johnny kills himself and goes to hell and heaven, then finds himself back in earth, unsure whether he really died at all. Anyways, I really like Vasquez's style, reminds me of Tim Burton's stop motion animations. Vasquez writes "Z?" all over his comics in reference to insomniacs and to "question sleep." I wrote down some of my favorite lines from issue #6 of JtHM.

Ren Honjo

Guess what? Another manga sketch from the '05 sketchbook, from the series "Nana."  This character is Ren Honjo, who I personally loved as a character. SPOILER ALERT:He eventually dies later on in the series after a drug addiction causes him to get into a car accident. But I really liked his character because he was so incredibly flawed...yet he was also incredibly like-able. He was less of a character and more of a person. Most of the characters in "Nana" had back stories that explained how they got to be the person they were. It was one of the reasons why I read the series so religiously for a while there. But anyways, I drew Ren doing what he did best: playing bass and smoking his cigarettes.

On a Broken String

I made this Sunday, while I was listening to "Ballon on a Broken String" by The Boy Least Likely To.  The lyrics are from the song, and the painting was inspired by it. It's just one of many songs that I can relate to. The painting actually reminds me of my childhood room, which had a balloon theme until I was 13 years old.

Han Chae Young

Many people who know me know that I have an addiction. It's kind of been a secret that's starting to spill out. I'm not sure people know how long I've had this addiction. But here it goes... I'm addicted to Korean Dramas. Yes. I know. WTF? Korean Dramas? How does that even happen? Cue shot of 13 year-old me, channel surfing, and stopping on AZN, the Asian channel, where the Korean drama "Ruler of Your Own World" was playing every day after school. (Yeah, I still remember the name of the Korean drama that gateway entered me into the world of kdramas) Anyways, this is a sketch I made in '08 of Korean Actress Han Chae Young while I was watching her Korean drama "Only You." Yeah, lame title for a show, I know. I was honestly addicted to it at the time.

Live Loud

This is a sketch I made at the very end of '07. "Live Loud" has always been one of my life philosophies. Kinda just mean do what you want, go against the grain, leave a mark... that kind of idea. Made with my colored pencils, markers and a couple color pens. I really hate this guy's nose though, always bothers me when I look at it.

Deryck

Another sketch from the '05 sketchbook. Guess I'm feeling nostalgic. Back then I didn't really date my sketches all the time, so I have no idea when in '05 this was made, but I know it is from that year. As I've stated in previous posts, the sketchbook is mostly filled with either comic book, anime & manga characters or Sum41 band members. So here's one of my Sum41 band member sketches. It's supposed to be Deryck Whibley. I don't know if I would agree I captured him, but I guess it was a learning process.

Club Normal

I did this a couple days ago, finished painting and gluing everything yesterday. Mostly about having to wait for me to enjoy normal things. Life's bouncer is just not letting me in. I used some candy wrappers for the line poles. I think they turned out pretty cool. I used construction paper for the line rope. I wanted to make it cartoon-ish, with my real pictures chillin' out of place. Because they are not from that world. Symbolism? Who knew I was deep, right?

Against Me

Started this yesterday. I guess we all feel like everyone's against us at some point. The lyrics are from "Fly" by Nicki Minaj. I've been doing a lot of thinking about all the people I haven't seen in a while, and I get defensive about it to myself and to them. I have this way of always trying to see the good in people, but lately I just see nothing. Been doing some really crazy stuff lately in my sketchbook...not sure what to put up and what not to. I guess we'll just have to wait it out and see if I want to put them up or not.

Underneath

Just another manga sketch from my '05 sketchbook. Not really anything special. I think I based this off of a character from a manga series called Kill Me, Kiss Me. But I'm not sure. 8th grade was a long time ago, not sure I remember drawing half of the sketches in this sketchbook. I really like the detail I point into the wrinkles on this one. Wrinkles on clothes fascinate me, because they are always on us, and it gives us an idea of who's really under them.

Ugly Wrinkles

This was made a month ago, right after I'd gotten out for the summer. This is a kind of difficult one for me to post. It's not exactly a poem, not exactly my thoughts either. I think metaphors were the best way I could describe the state I was in. The best I can explain it is that sometimes I wish I was normal. Maybe it's the paranoia, or just my own self hatred that everyone has... But it's the way I feel at times when I'm around a lot of people. Sometimes I feel like I'm different, and not in a good way.

Nana Osaki

I was debating about whether I wanted to put stuff up on here from '05, since that was such a long time ago. I was in 8th grade during the time most of these sketches/drawings were made. But I decided it's part of me, so I might as well include them. The majority of the stuff I did in my sketchbook in '05 has to do with anime, manga, and comic book characters or Sum41 band members. Yes, I used to have a weird obsession with all of those. I was kinda an odd kid, to be totally honest. But anyways, this sketch is of Nana Osaki from the manga series Nana. I really admired the character Nana Osaki because she lived her life on her own terms. She was a rockstar.

"Lucky" 13

This was made last Wednesday, after I'd watched the documentary Very Young Girls. This documentary really bothered me by its content. The subject matter was underage street prostitution. The average age of a prostitute on the street is 13. This bothers me so much because if that's the average, that means there are girls out there who are even younger than that. And the worst part about it is that more often than not these girls have been threatened, kidnapped, or have no where to hide from their pimp. So if they do get arrested, the police system charges them and when they get out, their pimp finds them and brings them back. Right now there is a new program within the FBI called the Innocence Lost National Initiative that is trying to hep target these pimps who force young girls to work for them.

Stranger

I made this about 3 weeks ago. It was from a memory of when I was waiting at the bus stop with another woman. I wanted to write down what my thoughts were at the time. Mostly, I felt a sort of kinship with her, because we were both just college girls trying to catch a bus. This painting was really done fast. I didn't sketch before hand, and I didn't have my many variations of paintbrushes that I did now. So the paint smudged a lot more than I wanted. So this is not my best work, but interesting, none the less.

Alexander Portman

I'm in the middle of working on a graphic novel. I've been throwing around the idea for it in my head for a while, and finally found some time to actually bringing it to life. I've got about three pages of done so far, so i got a lot more to go. But this is one of the character sketches. I was practicing drawing him from different views. This is one of my three main characters, Alexander Portman. Age: 23. Drug addict. Key to the apocalypse. Many people want to kill him.

Lonely Scene

I made this on Sunday. It's a scene from Blue Valentine, another film I'm a fan of. What I liked the best about this scene was the loneliness you can feel from it. Two people just got married, but somehow it's just lonely. The circumstances probably play a factor in that, but I suppose that's for someone who's seen the film to know. I'm a big Ryan Gosling fan, this isn't the only movie with him in it that I've drawn from.

Star

This was made in August of '08. It was originally a sketch, but a week ago I decided to paint it. I only noticed after I'd painted it that I'd given her too many fingers, assuming her thumbs are clutching her hood. I guess I'll just call this a creative mistake. I'll think of a reason later for it.

Roadtrip

This was made in August of '09, when I went on a camping trip with some friends of mine.  I love road trips. We drove "Up North" as we Michiganders like to call it, to a camp site. We got to kayaking, tubing, and made food over a fire. It was a fun time. But the whole way there and back in the car, I remember seeing all these signs and thinking I wonder who came up with all of them. Who is in charge of designing the signs that dictate the behavior of traffic?

Numb

When I was younger, I hated to show any kind of emotion. I don't know how I got this way, but I always believed emotion was weakness. I didn't want people to know how I was feeling, or even if I was feeling. And in a lot of ways, I am the same today.  I struggle a lot to even figure out what my feelings are on a situation or event, because I guess people could say I'm not "in touch with my own emotions." I just remember always thinking crying was bad, and that being angry was pointless. To some degree, I guess I still hold these views. But I've realized now that in purging myself of negative emotions, I sometimes lose grip on the positive ones. It's hard for me to let that guard down, because now I do it subconsciously, and then I just feel numb to everything.

Love Wins

I sketched and painted this yesterday. I've been wanting to make something about gay marriage/civil unions for a while. I think it's funny how there have been scandals with politicians who are against gay marriage/civil unions getting caught in homosexual acts. It makes me angry that love can be anyone's business. So I guess this is kinda making fun of those hypocritical politicians, and saying that love wins :)

Ignorance is Easy

I made this in 2010, sometime around November I think. At the time, I was really getting annoyed with the amount of ignorance people have about racial groups. The definition of ignorance is to not have knowledge about something, knowing this fact, and refusing to learn about it. Naviety is to not have knowledge about something, and not know that you do not have the knowledge. Educate yourself. Do not make statements based on what you think or have heard. Make them based on experience. Step outside your comfort zone. Feel outnumbered. Learn.

Through My Eyes

I spent most of yesterday messing around with video clips I had of my friends and I. Just wanted to show how life had been for me sophomore year. Plus, I really wanted to use the song "Vagabond" by Wolfmother sometime in a video, and it fit perfectly with what I wanted to do. It's not really supposed to be anything special, I guess I just wanted to show how special life is. My first video posting:

Jeux d'enfants

I finally found one of my sketchbooks from '09. I drew this sketch at the beginning of '09 I believe. It's a scene from the film "Jeux d'enfants," one of my favorite movies. It's a French film about two crazy people who play a game their whole lives, and yet never say anything about how they feel. I used a line from the male lead towards the end of the film. It's one of my favorite lines. Seriously, it might sound like a stupid film, but it is really good. Really crazy, but good.

Russian Roulette

I wrote the poem "Russian Roulette" April 25th, 2010. It was about a person who was playing way too many games, and making everything so much harder than it needed to be. I hate having to always struggle for power in a relationship, I hate feeling like everything is a game. I would rather someone just tell me how they feel than have to constantly debate to myself whether I want to risk my own feelings. Anyways, I found this poem a couple days ago, cut it up, and painted. This was the result.

One

I sketched this around the summer of '08 I think.  I decided to paint it yesterday, and I think it looks way cooler now. There isn't really much explanation for this one. I think I really just wanted to capture that feeling of a concert, where you're just one with everyone else there...in love with the music. Wish the world was like that all the time.

Demon

Sorry for the hiatus, I had a busy couple of days. I painted this yesterday; it was a sketch I drew a couple of days ago. I think it represents anger well. As well as just being bad ass. I started it as just a kickass girl with a gun, but then I started painting and she became a demon. I thought of Supernatural as I was painting.

Shut Up.

Many people who know me know that I suffer from paranoia at times. It gets especially bad at night, when I'm alone. It's ridiculous how many voices I feel like I have going in my head, saying different things, and making me worry about various implausible scenarios. I made this in September of '08 one night, when I wished they would all just shut up. I really wanted to sleep. So I gave voices to these thoughts and immediately told them to just listen to me.

Life is Beautiful.

I made this last week at a friend's house. I wanted to just show growth and life, I guess. Sometimes we forget how beautiful everything is about the fact we are given life. Just taking time to appreciate.

Hands Held High

This is from my sketchbook in '08. Not really a sketch, but I was really inspired by the words in Linkin Parks' "Hands Held High," which spotlighted the need for people to speak up and not be afraid.  Religion can be a source of hope, faith, and strength to speak. It also talks about religion and violence, and how both are connected. This is another song I recommend you check out.

Euphoria

( Sketch - August 26, 2008)Have you ever had that moment where you are out in nature and the breeze brushes against your skin...and you feel like everything is perfect? You're just glad to be alive in such an amazing place. It's this happy, calm feeling that I call euphoria.