Sayu Anime-Cartoon backpack

This was drawn originally on July 17 2019 and painted on July 19 2019. I wanted to try out TES‘s style again. I first drew it out with a copic W7, I exaggerated certain features and simplified the colors. I found that using copic as the line art is quite amazing for not just digital painting but also with mediums like watercolors. It’s just a shame they stopped making their color multiliners (should have bought some when I had the chance). I tried using them with my g pen but the dry off on the tip rather quickly. I guess I’ll have to use their pen refill system and create my own.

Hasta la proxima,

-NUBE

December 28, 2019 0

Sayumi Michishige Lee long shirt

I finally bit the bullet and bought a set of Holbein watercolors back in September. I bought the 108 color set. Sad to say but I was too busy to paint more than one painting since I got them. Hopefully I can do another one soon. I debuted the paints with a painting of Sayumi Michishige wearing a long sleeve shirt. I also decided to use my lightbox to trace and ink/hatch/crosshatch to see how it would look.

It was painted originally on September 11, 2019 and drawn originally on September 18, 2019.

Combined, done today:

I should have more time for a couple of weeks now, I’m aiming to do more art during this time.

Hasta la proxima,

-NUBE

December 10, 2019 0

The Mummy Sayu and Momochi Attack!!!

For the last day of Inktober which of course lands on Halloween, I decided to draw Sayu and Momochi saving me from Imhotep (the mummy). It can be found here. This is the first painting I have done after at least a month. I felt quite comfortable painting despite the gap surprisingly.

Within the movie there is two scenes where Imhotep is scared of cats due to him being cursed and punished in the underworld. I thought it would be funny if he got afraid after seeing Sayu and Momochi acting like cute cats.

I really enjoyed adding the effects on top of the painting, it makes everything pop.

It was painted using Corel painter

Yurushite Nyan!!! m( =∩王∩= )m

Hasta la proxima,

-NUBE

November 8, 2019 0

First drawing, inking and painting of 2019

I took about a week off from Christmas to New Years but have been working on some new pieces during that time. On around January 3rd I started to work on the first artwork of 2019. Of course I decided to make a drawing/inking/painting of Sayumi Michishige. I had bought her new photobook “Dream” last year but didn’t open it till New Years. I really loved it. Some of the photos are quite magical and give a fairy tale feel.

What I ended up doing was choosing some photos from her “Dream” photobook, Instagram and some others I had stored up. I wasn’t too sure about how I would have done the background but it turned out to be a good opportunity to try out using some patterned papers that I have been collecting over the years. I have been stockpiling them but I haven’t actually used them in anything till now (I tried making one before with The Kubo artwork but it was a failed attempt). I did edit these patterned background, which makes me excited to see what I can do with them. Speaking of the background I wanted to draw the rabbit from the Haro Moni show where they had a segment going on amusement rides to promote merchandise. But I was afraid I would be a little too similar to an amazing painting done by koha . You can check it out here

I really love the way she was painted and the way the rabbit stands in the back. When I finished my painting and I went to look at Koha’s I was surprised at how different our styles and techniques were.

For the color selections I decided to scan my current Copic swatches that I use traditionally to choose colors. From there I used the colors I had closest to what I wanted and edited them as needed. (I would upload the swatches but as I was working with them I noticed that they were a bit off so I need to go through them and make sure the colors are correct).

Here is the final piece:

And just for you guys who stop by here some other versions (I liked the idea that I could change the tights design, heck even the color should be easy to change):

This one is with out any lightening of some lines from the original drawing-

And one with Sayu using a polkadot design instead of the bunnies-

Here are the references used:

This is the main one I used but I obviously edited her pose and added some different clothes (the one on the bottom) –

And here are the rest (the Usa Chan Peace pose being very important):

And this is the patterned paper I used as the base for background –

I didn’t really focus too much on documenting the process because I just wanted to paint without any distractions and just enjoy the process. Having said that, here are the few I pictures of the process I do have:

Sayu as a brunette:

I’ve gotten quite comfortable just painting it all on one layer, at least with these more realistic pieces. The background I do make another separate piece since I can work much faster that way without having to mess with the main subject. I do want to paint Sayu in a traditional medium, I have some Arches water color paper that I have been wanting to use for a couple of months now so hopefully that will be done soon.

And with that I end this first post of the year. Here’s to hoping we have a great year ahead of us, let’s keep working at it.

Hasta la proxima,

-NUBE

Usa Chan Peace! V(⁎˃ᆺ˂)V

January 10, 2019 0

First painting corel painter 2018 Sayumi Michishige

This painting was finished on August 15.

I’ve been wanting to learn how to add color to my pieces so the best way is to study photos and also see why other peoples paintings work by recreating them. Using the eyedropper tool is quite useful but I want to practice and learn how to choose color just by using my eyes and instincts. Doing it traditionally is easier since I’m limited to the colors I have in hand. But digitally I have to really focus and think about it since I have every color imaginable at my disposal so it can get a bit overwhelming and the chance of screwing up is quite a possibility.

At the time of this painting I had invested in upgrading my Corel version up to 2018. So this is the inaugural painting I did for it. Corel and Photoshop are quite different. Photoshop is quite versatile and one can do a lot of things with it quite easily when it comes to editing but I feel that Corel is the better program to paint. Something about it makes painting more intuitive. But I tend to switch from one to the other when creating new paintings regularly. Sometimes I hit a bump and for some reason seem to find it easier to do on the other program. (・∧‐)ゞ

In any case I of course chose Sayumi Michishige as the subject, as you can guess I really love her aesthetic and her photo books are filled with a lot of great pictures to choose from. As stated before I chose colors by eyeballing it and am surprised I wasn’t too far off. If you compare my painting to the photo of course there are a lot of differences but I feel like I managed to capture the essence and you can tell it’s Sayu right? (๑•̀ㅂ•́)و✧

This is the reference picture used from Sayu’s photobook “La”:

Here is the process:

The eyes were too big so I had to resize them.

And that should wrap it up for now. I really loved working on this painting and am glad I was able to get it to this point. It looks realistic but also like a painting which I really like.

Hope you guys like it.

Hasta la proxima,

-NUBE

November 1, 2018 0

Inktober 2018 #22 Michishige Sayumi Sports Festival

This time I decided to once again give the maru nib a try again. I looked up information on the net but it seems like a stiff nib is normal when they are new so I used some paper to make some lines and see if I could make the ink flow. It started flowing but it’s so small that the ink is a bit of a pain to make work. I made a small and quick drawing of Sayu doing the Usa-chan Peace. With the maru nib releasing ink I decided to finally do the drawing.

This is a picture from the Sports Festivals that Hello Project used to do back in the day. Those days sure were filled with a lot of fun events. Sad they ended by the time the Platinum Era was around… (︶︹︺)

In any case, although the maru nib gave me problems as I went along it did work remarkably. It allows me to make subtle shading quite easily and more precisely (when it decides to work).

Man… so freakin cute… ⸌̷̻( ᷇ॢ〰ॢ ᷆◍)⸌̷̻♡⃛

Here is the reference picture:

And here is the process:

Personally I loved the way the drawing came out. ◝( ′ㅂ`)و ̑̑

Hasta la proxima,

-NUBE

October 22, 2018 0

Inktober 2018 #21 Michishige Sayumi Short Hair

A while ago now (wow 4 years ago ∑(ﾟﾛﾟ〃)) Sayumi was rumored to have cut her hair short which was a big deal since she had always had her beautiful long and natural hair colored hair. As it turns out it was I believe a wig where Sayu and the other Momosu members had different hairstyles that they didn’t use.

And man let me tell you, she looked absolutely amazing. I was surprised by how short they decided to go with the hairstyle but it fit her really well.

For this piece I had decided to give the maru pen nib a try but it was so small and stiff so I couldn’t really get it to work. I had no choice but to give up since it was getting really late. In the end I used my G nib and some of my other pens. It went well for the most part but I feel I messed a bit on her chin and lower head. I could have played a bit more with the values and I’m pretty sure it would look much better. But overall I liked the way the piece turned out.

Here is the reference picture used:

I really want to give it another shot and do another one traditionally.

Here is the process:

That’s it for now.

Hasta la proxima,

-NUBE

October 21, 2018 0

Trying out an ANIME X CARTOON style: Sayumi Michishige

While looking through Pixiv and some Mexican memes on “Fresh Anime Memes from a Mexican Otaco” I came across two artist that made art that was rather cartoony and “round” and yet also very anime like. I really like it so I wanted to give it a try.

This was done in 8/10/18:

I believe I did this with my dip pen and a pen named Bimoji Fedepen, the hard tip one (there are various types that also go to a brush type that is pretty cool).

This is the reference picture I used. This was from Sayu’s photo book “Mille-feuille”.

I then colored the line art with my Copic markers (process will be shown a bit below). I noticed that I was much too preoccupied with the way the other artist were drawing their eyes from the references (will post them below) I was looking at so she looks a bit angry.

Noticing that I used, I believe Photoshop to widen her eyes.

I widened them even more, and noticed that there is quite a bit of flexibility with this style so I really want to try out more things to see what I can come up with.

These were some of the references I used to try and understand the style.

Artist – Sh1tty:

And here is the process:

When I finished painting this piece and scanning it I had to go ahead and correct the colors that get washed out in the scanning process.

After that I began trying out different eye shapes.

That should be all for now.

Hasta la proxima,

-NUBE

September 20, 2018 0

First attempt at using Stabilo Pens – subject: Michishige Sayumi

I recently bought some new pens when I went to a somewhat local art store. When I was browsing around I came upon some pens that I haven’t seen before named Stabilo pens. After looking at them I noticed that they were almost exactly what I was looking for. In the past Copics used to have multiliners that came in different colors which I would have loved to use as outlines for my artwork, but they got discontinued a good bit ago. Ever since I was trying to find a replacement I could try and use instead but I wasn’t too happy with the limited selection Prismacolor had so I haven’t really used them since I bought them a couple of years ago. But these Stabilo pens seem to have a rather robust color selection and they also offered different nib sizes (though for now I’m really only interested in the multiliner type). And when I saw their price being really cheap I thought what the heck, so I bought 10 (all of them either skin tones or grays). So since this was going to be my first try using them I decided to give the honor to Michishige Sayumi as the subject. Here’s what it looks like finished (done with my new Stabilo pens and Copics). Process below for those who are interested.

It’s been a while since I’ve done a piece traditionally so I was a bit worried, but it went rather smoothly and the whole portrait took me only a couple of hours.

On the right are my new pens, these are the colors I have so far.

And as usual I start outlining using my 2H pencil.

And that leads me to the finished piece (already shown at the beginning):

My thoughts on the Stabilo pens? So far I really love them. They leave beautiful marks and are resistant to my Copics too. Not only that but the color selection makes them quite useful for different applications. I’m definitely planning on upgrading my collection. The only downside is that they don’t seem to be refillable, but they’re not expensive so it’s not a big deal. Can’t wait to see what I can create with them.

-Bonus-

In any case, as I was writing this I had recently gotten off my other job and was happy to find a new video with members of Platinum Era Morning Musume, and that led me to another video that happened to give me a rather happy coincidence.

-By the way I use a dual monitor set up, left is my XP-Pen (that doubles as a monitor when not used for art) and my normal monitor on the right.

Anyway as I was watching this video I noticed that Sayu was looking right at them as they performed, I noticed this and found it funny and a coincidence as a certain number was happening. (I know I’m the only one finding pleasure and happiness in this but whatever).

Those who get it, get it.

Anyway, that’s this update.

Hasta la proxima,

-Nube

September 6, 2018 0

Painting Sayumi Michishige digitally with my new XP-PEN

On April 23 of this year I decided to take another plunge and buy an on screen graphics tablet. Of course one does have to be weary of anything that is cheap. So I was pondering first about buying a graphics tablet for a couple of years, then when I did have money saved up I began noticing the other options. At first I was thinking about getting the Wacom Cintiq 13HD, but I’m living in a time that new competitors are emerging in China. On top of that, they offer bigger sizes at around 1/3 of the price of Wacom’s 13 in. offering. I decided to wait it out till a good amount of reviews and tests were done on them. A number of reviews seemed to be positive but there were not that many of them. Then at some point it seems like these products were being given away to Youtube artist so that they could “review” them (many of them were just unboxings). On top of that, they were always compared to Wacom Cintiqs (which is ok) but they tended to focus on it way too much. In the end these reviews really didn’t give me much confidence. Specially since I hadn’t used any on screen graphics tablet before so many of the points they were making I couldn’t really connect to.

One piece of advice I did connect to was that a bigger screen would work much better since I would have more space to work and wouldn’t have to be squinting or enlarging the image as much. So despite the countless positives of owning a Cintiq, I decided to bite the bullet and buy an XP-PEN Artist 22E ( it’s a 22-inch display graphic monitor). It’s strange, it is quite an expensive device so I almost felt bad about buying it. I even didn’t use it for a week, it just laid by my desk covered by my jacket. But at some point I decided to give it a try. Since this was my first graphics display I struggled a bit setting it up. But it’s actually quite easy when you know what you are doing. A quick tip is to set it all up is using the pen program used for this tablet. If this is your only display than you shouldn’t have a problem, but if you have a two display set up make sure you choose the XP-PEN as the correct monitor and also make sure it isn’t chosen as the extended option (this was the only thing that gave me a hard time). If it seems to not be working, remember that you should restart your computer after you install the driver and program.

I didn’t really want to write anything about this display till I had used it for a good bit. So far it has been two months, so I will document my experiences so far (I will do so in the future as well, I’m quite interested if this tablet will last me a good while or if it will only last for a year of something).

So far I’m content with it. I know a bit more about digital art, so now that I have this on screen graphics display I can work much faster since I’m actually drawing and painting on the canvas itself. One can get used to the other tablet like the Bamboo Manga I used previously, but nothing beats working on the artwork directly. And with the two monitor system I can work on the XP-PEN and look at my reference picture/s and even some sort of entertainment on my second monitor. It works quite great. I used to use my laptop to work on artwork, but now I’m using my PC that my brother gave me which is much more powerful and can take quite a beating (with all the programs I use simultaneously).

The monitor itself works quite well and seems to be of a good quality. In the reviews they talked a lot of paralaxing, but since I’ve never used a better display or really see it as a problem, I really don’t notice it. If I want to draw or paint somewhere the paint applies my paint where I want it. The on frame buttons are also quite useful and have increased my workflow. It came with a stand included that worked great but it took a good amount of my desk real state. So with that in mind I decided to invest in a monitor arm. But I was also weary of buying a cheap one that would break easily or would not move the way I need it to. After much thought and research I decided to go for the Amazon basics arm (in fact another reviewer of this display bought this arm which prompted me to give it a try). Now with this arm and the display I can work much better, more comfortable and faster. Before I was contemplating buying a wireless keypad and converting the keys into hot keys for the art programs like Photoshop. But with this set up I can have the display above the keyboard and away from my arms when I’m drawing and is easily accessible when I need to make a command.

One thing that really freaked me out was that the pen was leaving scratches on the display. I couldn’t really find much about it online, but I guess this is normal… These scratches also leave behind a rainbow effect on the screen but if you clean it off a bit it the rainbowing effect disappears so it really isn’t a problem. I wonder if a softer stylus tip exists? Whatever the case, after a while you don’t really notice it. I guess it’s one of those things where you get a new item and you are always weary of scratching it or something.

As for what can be done with it, that just depends on one’s skills.

I chose Sayumi Michishige as my first model for my very first artwork on this tablet.

This is the reference picture I chose:

Here is what I managed to do with it, my first digital study:

This was done on May the 18th. Since then I have been working some more work which I will upload soon.

So far I really love my new XP-PEN, but time will tell if it was a solid investment and will last me a good couple of years or if it’s a cheap “imitation” that will break in the near future. I’m hoping it it does last.

Hasta la proxima,

-NUBE

June 7, 2018 0

Trying to showcase my art around the world using the internet.

My skill have been rising, though I will improve much more, it is finally time for me to start trying to showcase my art around the world. So with that in mind I will start uploading it to various sites such as Pixiv, Pinterest, Tumblr, Facebook and DeviantArt (which I have already been doing). I placed some test drawings that I hope will get my feet wet and allow me to understand how best to post art and link it to this website.

Here’s hoping it all goes well.

-XERO

June 22, 2015 0

Update and some thoughts part I

I now have finally finished and made a decision when it came to Asuka’s drawing. I will upload it on Friday and for now I will see what else I will be working on.

Now as for something else I wanted to talk about is the graduation of Sayumi Michishige. If I’m correct she has already graduated as of yesterday. This marks the last of the members of my ever favorite Platinum Era. I don’t really know how I feel right now. I feel kind of, off. Though I seriously can’t get myself to look at any of the new stuff that Morning Musume has made (mainly because I get nothing but nostalgia to about how it was almost 5 years ago now, and sadness because it is now all over). I’m sure all the new members are good, but the current Morning Musume. 14 is not for me. It’s for the new generation of fans and all the hardcore Momusu fans that have been there all along.

It actually wasn’t until recently that I found out that I wasn’t really a fan of Morning Musume, no, I was a fan of the members from the Platinum Era that ran from the end of 2007 till the very end of 2010. They were, just different from any other idol groups. In fact, Idol groups never really caught my attention. It was Morning Musume that changed my mind about what an idol group could do, and that they could and maybe even should be taken seriously (more on this later). And although I can’t do that for every idol group, I did gain some respect and even got to like a couple of other idol groups like Berryz Koubou and Cute (yeah I’m an H.P. fan almost exclusively). Though I liked and still like to look at the videos that were in the Golden Era and the Eras before the Platinum Era, I finally realized that the reason I liked looking at this videos is because I got to look at most of the Platinum Era members in their first years in the Idol world growing up before it was them taking the reigns of the group. It’s amazing how things turned out. I just get really warm and fuzzy looking at those videos and the ones during the Platinum Era.

What’s sad is that I can’t really get to enjoy much of the videos and content after 2010. All that comes to mind are the words; “it is not the same anymore”, “They are all separated now”, “Why couldn’t they have stayed together?” and “They were the best line-up”. Most of the members in the Platinum Era were good at singing and dancing, and those that weren’t like Sayu had other strengths that made the whole group even stronger. And that is what I liked about this line up. They all had weaknesses but they made up for it by working as a group, and that made them strong. And in my opinion it made them the strongest line-up that there ever was and ever will be. But it seems like the fans aren’t really into that. They tend to prefer the more electronic and autotuned songs more (funny, I remember when many people made a big deal of “Kimagure Princess” because they used a bit of autotune). What am I doing? I’m getting off topic.

It’s strange seeing how things turned out and my feelings that come out because of it. Ai, Gaki and even JunJun didn’t pursue singing, instead they went into acting. Ai got married (this was a big blow for me, specially because she married this questionable older guy). Aika stayed behind in H.P. but is now gone to study English in New Zealand (I’m actually quite happy she decided to further her education). Sayu was still in Morning Musume and has created this great bond with the new members (this makes me sad, somehow I feel jealous that she may like them more than the Platinum Era Members – minus Eri). And speaking of Eri, she hasn’t made a return after leaving Morning Musume after the 2010 graduation (man how I miss her). Luckily there were at least two member who are still singing. LinLin decided to go solo in China. She went with a more “children’s style” songs. Although I like that she is still singing I didn’t really like it much (well to be fair I am not a child so… yeah). I did really like her third song that was in her single. It was more her style I think and it was beautiful, I really hope she sings more songs like that. And another person who has been keeping my attention even after graduation more than anyone is Reina Tanaka. All her decisions I have really liked up to now. She decided to continue singing. So she had a rock band get together. I actually think she goes well with the members (strangely enough I have nothing against them, in fact I think I actually like them). She had a rough start since they were doing just covers for the old guys in Up-Front but after a couple of events they finally got to sing some of their own material. And most of the recent material is really good. I like the path they have taken. What I like most of Reina is that she actually said what I and many other Platinum Era fans have been saying all this time, The Platinum Era was the greatest there ever was. And she even questioned just how far they would have gotten had they been more popular. This… this just made me so happy. To have one of the the members of that time, and even a member that many thought really wasn’t enjoying her time with those members say these words. And have it be one of my favorite members second only to Ai (though they did fight that position many times). I just felt this warm feeling that it wasn’t just an illusion what I was witnessing. That was a magical time.

This is getting long, but I will just end it with this. Thank you Platinum Era Morning Musume. With Sayu graduated, now there are no ties to you which is sad. But, I have hope that someday all these members will get together and form something special that will take the world by storm. (wishful thinking I know, but I will continue to hope)

Here’s to hope in the future,

-XERO

November 26, 2014 0