The Last Party

They were sitting around the table. While some had half filled glasses of whiskey in their hands, yet others had some cigarettes burning away, both tobacco and lives. The topic of conversation was mostly random. It varied from the latest TV soaps to sports to games to computers to software and so on. In other words, it was all looking like a normal bachelors party. It seemed that the converstations would never finish, but that wasn't the case. Being men, they weren't accustomed to chatting away without reason or logic. So there came a time when the conversation ended and the men kept quiet sipping away the glasses or the smoke.

Now, at this point of time, people would look at each other and wait for someone to say, "I'm going back home." and then take the oppurtunity to tag along home with them. This was the best way to avoid being the bad guy who wants to finish the party. But the silence continued. I would have continued, but it was sadly killed by the ringing of a mobile phone. Everyone looked at the owner of the mobile phone. The spectacled man calmly took out his phone,and then recieved it.

"Hello... Oh! How are you... <silence> ...well... <silence> ...ok ok... <silence> ...I understand, it's not really an issue... &lt;silence&gt; ...but I'm telling you... ...it's not an issue, is your head full of hay or something... &lt;silence&gt; ...ok I'm sorry... &lt;short silence&gt; ...listen... I'll call you back soon. Lemme get out of a situation first."and he dropped the call to look at his mates staring at him throughout the 10 minutes of the converstation.

"When did you get a girl?"
"I didn't get a girl... not yet... it was... an old friend of mine. H..he was... has been requesting me to meet him for the past 2 weeks."
"Like hell I'll believe ya."
"Well, you don't have to, not your concern anyway."
"No, but the girl is... who is she, or rather how is she?"
"Ugh... you all are so persistant... well... I'll have to leave now."
"OOOOOoooo... the bastard is diching us for some woman we don't even know is worth being our sister in law."
"God Dammit, how many times do I have to say it to get the idea through that thick skulls of yours."
"You think we've got thick skulls eh? Well, lemme tell ya, you've got the thicker skull amongst us, and let me prove it to you."

The big bloke took an empty bottle and smashed it on his head. It wasn't a fatal blow, but deep nonetheless. It did cause the specs guy to collapse. Blood spilled as everyone once again looked at each other and then the unconsious body amidst the deeper silence. But the depth of the silence was pulled out by the same ringing of the mobile phone.One of the guys picked up the phone and looked at it's display. It was an unknown number. He was alread steered by the 8 glasses of neat alcohol he had. He picked up the phone and heard a rather sweet voice.

"Hello? Hello? Ani?"
"Err... no. We his... I mean... We're his friends here. He rushed away forgetting to take his cellphone with him."
"Good. He must rush now. The deadline is down by another half an hour. If you can contact him then do tell him this, otherwise his promotion won't escalate."
"Err... Pardon. He is getting promoted?"
"Yes. That's all the message I had. Goodnight."
"Ah! Wait... lemme ask..."
"&lt;beep&gt; &lt;beep&gt; &lt;beep&gt; &lt;beep&gt;"

He removed the handset from his ears and looked towards his mates. His mates could only follow his side of the conversation. So they all questioningly looked at him.
"Tell me. Was he doing any job or was he employed somewhere?"
"Not that I know of anything."
And then they all turned their heads towards the unconcious specs guy... only this time, the specs guy wasn't there. He was gone. Only the small pool of blood that oozed out from his head remained.
"Where did he go?"
Before anyone could answer that question, there was a huge bang that seemed to come from a distance. The big guy fell on the ground flat. He had a hole on his forehead.
"Snipe..."
But another bang cut his shout midway. He too fell down. The others had scattered away in different directions by then. Each was running away for the sake of his or her own life.

===================================================
The inspector put down the morning newspaper. The headlines gave a news that a huge bombing plan was thwarted by the intelligence agency at midnight. A buzzer rang. A lean looking man came in.
"Things went well yesterday didn't it?"
"Yes. But the ending... was it good to do what you did?"
"No. It was actually a bad bad thing. But I decided so because he was involved in that for the past 3 years. There was no guarantee that he would continue to remain on our side."
"He didn't look like the kind of guy who'd jump boats. He kept all the flow of information from time to time, and always alerted us of major incidents."
"Maybe you didn't know this, but he recieved a call from some woman last night, about 15 minutes before the incident."
"Some woman? Who?"
The inspector smiled. "That's a twist indeed. He got a call form Officer Jenny."
"Officer Jenny?" and the lean man thought for some time. "Wasn't she on trial for leaking information to the terrorists?"
"And guess which terrorist guy she was leaking all that to?" and then the inspector laughed out loudly.
The lean man gaped at the inspector. "Don't tell me that..."
"I won't... it was unpleasant for me to. That bastard gave us the wrong coordinates... but somehow, his phone requested a GPS coordinate in middle of the call, and we intercepted it in time. He told me he was under the bridge, but you know where we encountered them right?"
"The Security station near the Parliament House..."
"All of them were there to dress up as security today."
The lean man shook his head in disbelief... that was all that he could do.


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Author's Note
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Another creation out off the office desk :D
Well, it's arbid and very very incomplete. But I've never really managed to write complete sounding short stories. :-/

When...

When life seems to run out of options,

Remember me my friend.

For it was me who as always beside you,

Waiting, for you to reach the end.

When times seem to run ahead of you,

Come back to me my friend.

For you don't have to race it,

I'm a gift that God has send.

When things don't go your way,

Let me lead you down a different path.

For, you are my only existence,

And I am your conscience.

============================================

Something I wrote down in the office. I'm now feeling what it feels like to have nothing to do. :-/

I have problems with net connectivity at home (I don't even have a fixed home right now... -__- ), but I pray that I get out of these predicatements as soon as possible.

The laptop company gave me won't let me install any browser except IE8, so surfing properly is also an issue here... :( The laptop  is nice otherwise :)

Under a night sky

Copyrights, Selenium Glow :) (This image is the intro image.)

Do you believe in fantasies?
Do you believe that your dreams are a part of your own soul?
Do you believe that your dreams are a display of what your soul desires?
Do you believe that your dreams are a fallacy of god, an error that enables you to see through the fabric of space and time surrounding us?
Do you believe?
Or are you the kind that can never believe... not even themselves.

It is execptionally dark. Usually in cities, no corner escapes the bright night life of the civilization that is at it's peak.
But, just like a cloud with a silver lining, a city too has it's dark spots.
It's execptionally dark. She breaths the cold winter air. It's so cold that she wouldn\'t have inhaled it if she had an option.
But she had no option. She had to inhale. She had to breath the air to live. But why did she want to live? The only answer she could think was...

"Because I have no other option eh?"

==========================
Or so what I wrote on the intro of the VN I was programming. That has now come to a hold as I now have to take my job training seriously... -__-;

The moonlit sky image is what I made using that clouds brushes that I posted about last time. The Moon is taken from a photograph that my brother took of the night sky some time back. :)

I'll have less and less due to training and what not (miss my manga/anime T__T ) time but I'll try to keep posting here.

P.S - Oh. Yes, I liked the new draft.blogger page. It's very new and refreshing. :) Did you fellow blogger like it as well?

Clouds n Stuff

Well, long long time ago, I tried to make clouds using Photoshop. I thought it would be hard, so I tried to make some using 3D software. Not an easy task either. So?

So, I give up temporarily and decide to do some outdoor observation. After quiet a lot of sky gazing, I downloaded some tutorials on how to make clouds. I also downloaded some plugin for my 3D software which would allow me to make clouds. I tried the 3D software first. and the results weren't something I was happy with. :-/  Well, these two were what I came out with. Later, I would realize that the technique I used to make the clouds wasn't the best, and the actual technique I needed to used meant that I had to wait 20 minutes for one frame to render into an image that you see below. Ah! I realize I need a faster computer...

The first trial to make Clouds in 3D software. That obelisk is just to add some subject to the image...

This is the second trial. This time I tried playing the the position of the sun and some color effects for the obelisk.

Well, then I downloaded some tutorials to make clouds on Photoshop. Once again not an easy task if you lack patience. I tried to follow the tutorial and finally came up with this image.

Made using the original tutorial. No shortcuts used while making this one. It's completely from scratch.

But I realized that patience is something that few people have. Sadly, I'm not in that few... -__-;;
So, I Google, and find that there are some preset cloud brushes/textures available for download, that can be used with Photoshop to make some quick but good looking clouds. So, I download all that I could, and then create a new image. My first trial (without using layers or effects) at using these presets gave me this image.

Created in under 7 minutes using Photoshop.

Well, looks very impressive ne? Even if there isn't any bit of realism, even than it's very pleasant looking to my eyes. As long as something looks good, people will rarely question the amount of realism in it. As I wrote this blog, I created a night scene (again unrealistic) with lots of stars and stuff and a full moon. But I made that image while programming a visual novel... so I'll post that later.

Until then, Ciao. :)

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Photoshop brushes used in the last image are credited to the following.

1) leboef.deviantart.com
2) Milinda Design - www.milinda.eu

My first Tablet sketch.

When I first purchased my (ultra cheap and local) drawing tablet in February, the first thing I ever did with it was to trace an image of Saber from the Fate/Hollow Ataraxia Visual Novel.

Original Wallpaper of Saber. There was a similar scene in the original "Fate/Stay Night" Novel

I used Adobe Illustrator CS 4 to do the tracing process. That time, it took me about an hour, but that time, I felt very satisfied with what I had done.

My Tracing for the above wallpaper.

However, do note that this is probably the most lousy trace you'd come across on the net. :-/ The lines are not clean and there are too many minor errors. In other words, this isn't something one would sit to seriously color. But yes, I have to admit, even tracing out many images is fun. It is hard work to do it nicely and professionally, but still, it's fun :)

The next image I traced was of a Wallpaper from "Jigoku Shoujo" (or Hell Girl).

Original Wallpaper of Enma Ai.

My (well) traced version. It's PNG. You can download and try coloring it yourself if you want ;)

In this trace, I specially tried to make sure the lines were cleanly done and that it was colorable. The complete tracing process alone took me about 3 hours, and the hairs were the toughest thing I had to tackle in this wallpaper. I even tried to color it, but then I was stumped when I had to do a background and work on highlights... -___- Copying things is turning out to be pretty hard work, I can only imagine how difficult it is going for me to make my own original creations... but I'm actually looking forward to that challenge.

The only trace that I've managed to color myself is this one. Also right now, I've traced an image of Belladandy and her two sisters (from the series Oh! My Goddess). I've already done the base coloring, but because I had some greeting cards to make for my friends upon their request, I couldn't quiet pick it up to completion. But I will complete it and post it on my blog :D

Belladandy and Her two sisters. More about them later. Color them if you want ;)

Yet another Tag

I've been again tagged... this time by ChocolateLover. Here goes another tag... :)

*My favourites*

Food: Anything Non-Veg, I don't mind Spicy food, but am more inclined to simple and bland taste.
Colour: Green and Orange
Sports: -__- errm... lets see... I did play basket ball in middle school and some cricket at a park nearby when I was in highschool.
Dessert: :D Cakes, Souffles, ice creams, Malpuas, Burfis, jelly, shakes, and what not :D :D :D I love sweets xD
Artist/Singer/Brand: I'll actually write a 100 page essay on this one day.
Pair of shoes: Anything that's comfortable
Outfit: T-Shirt/half shirt and shorts. For outside wear, I usually wear Cargo and T-Shirt/Shirts. I sometimes wear jeans too.
Accessory: Just a silver necklace with an american diamond that my mom forces me to wear as a protection charm. Sometimes my wrist watch.
Fav place: A quiet place, normally a roof or a coffee shop.
Hobbies: Playing and learning music, drawing, sketching, writing, and sometimes going over random topics in an encyclopedia.
Beauty product: Just one soap and a deodorant... and a hair shampoo... if all these count... :-/
Snacks: Hmm... I prefer something like Chaat.
Movies: Comedy, Action, Thriller.

-Q.E.D-

I am tagging:
Was I suppose to tag as well?? If you find this interesting then please help yourself to this tag and play along. :)

5 Weeks Later...

I originally wrote this as a facebook note. Here it is, in blogger where it should really be. Somehow, I don't like the Facebook notes thing. :-/ I have just copied and pasted the whole thing. Just remember while reading this, that this was originally written on May 10, 2011. This is the date that actually came 5 weeks later...

=======================

For the past 5 or so weeks, I've been giving 15 to 20 minutes daily trying to "Cel shade" a Sketch. The sketch isn't entirely my own original creation. I was watching the opening sequence of some animated series (it was "AIR"). I came across a scene where a girl was spreading out her arms. I took a snapshot and then decided to remake this in my way...

TV Original

Yes... easier said than done... specially by a guy who still isn't comfortable with digital inking and coloring...
Nonetheless, I accepted this challenge I put myself through... and then traced out the girl and the birds... or some birds... I couldn't do all of them... using Adobe Illustrator. I finally had this.

Traced in Adobe Illustrator

Things going nicely so far. But then I realized how difficult coloring was. I had to read and learn a lot of theory (yes... UPTU grade theory) on coloring, mixing and cel shading. I tried applying it on this outline, and somehow, it worked.
Many Many days later, I finally had this.

Colored version 1

But I realized the hair was too flat. On comparing with the Original, I find that I haven't outlined the hairs properly... :-/ It's an ultimate proof of either my carelessness or laziness... oh well... I draw the outlines in photoshop itself (instead of Illustrator) My untidy and unstable work is evident now...

Colored version with messy hair outlines...

Upto this point, I was coaxing myself for not being good enough with coloring and sketching. I told myself that cel shading is difficult and needs hard work... But what I found really really difficult and time consuming was the background. It's not easy to paint clouds realistically and above all - Beautifully. I had a lot of problems doing the clouds. I mostly copied the pattern of the original image. But this drove me nuts... Still I was able to make something.

My Final Version with these... umm... clouds.

I've done even a more lousy job with the background. The colors are out of control... the "Glare" effect is done badly... and the clouds look so... so... errmm... I don't even have the proper word to describe it's incompleteness or unrealism.

To conclude this note, I think I've learnt many new things in Photoshop and Illustrator alike, but above all... I realized I've a long way to go before I even dream of becoming a pro in digital arts... :-/
5 Weeks later... I feel morbidly discouraged... T__T

=================================
And thus, this concludes what I posted on facebook a long time ago. Well, this was my first attempt at coloring a complete frame myself. It was hard work...

P.S. - Yes, despite my negative post on Facebook, I did receive a lot of encouragement. Thus, I'm now in lookout for some more interesting frames that i can remake... :D

Tags

I so wanted to brag about my Drawing Pad and the stuff I draw with it... but it seems I've been tagged by Ayu... so for now, I'll play along with this one.

RULES:

• Each tagged person must post ten things about themselves
• You have to choose and tag ten people
• Go to their blogs and tell them you tagged them
• No tags back
• Have fun

Ten Things About Me

1. I don't spend too much time grooming myself. Thus I always have a sloppy looking face.
2. I like sweets. Lots of them. Can't live without them.
3. That said, I also like to eat... good food. I go to restaurants, dhabas, stalls, malls, etc from time to time just to satisfy my taste buds with some new taste each time.

4. I'm mostly a cool minded guy, I don't get angry too easily. However 5 to 6 years ago, I was short tempered... very short tempered.
5. I'm brutally honest. This is to my disadvantage mostly.
6. I like to jot down my dreams in my diary from time to time
7. I'm addicted to anime. Much better than people addicted to cigarettes and alcohol and what not...
8. Absentminded.
9. I do suffer from periodic hits of inferiority complex... but that's just me. Thanks to the students living next to my flat, I get over with it soon enough. :)
10. My mind is more Creative than Analytical... and I have a bad Memory. :/

Ten People I Wanna Tag

Now, I don't have 10 people to tag... I don't follow that many blogs (partially due to my laziness and partially due to the amount of time)

I'll still tag as many as I can... Alphabetically :)

1)  @$|-| (Ash... or however he writes it)
2) Arjit
3) Azeron
4) Chocolate Lover
5) Kyo
6) Samadrita (Also tagged by Ayu)
7) Tharangi (Also tagged by Ayu)

P.S - Hmm... I guess the habit of adding a P.S at the end of each blog post has now become a dangerous habit...

The Painter and The Photographer

Here is a render of what might look like sunrise on mars. Even though I added this as my status on Facebook 2 months ago, but what I didn't put on Facebook (mostly because of the public that would fail to comprehend) was a story behind this picture. Well, all my graphic or musical creations have a story with them.

A sunrise on "The God of War"

It was pretty silent. The darkness outside wasn't uplifting him either. However, he waited because he needed to burn the image of sunrise into his head. Unlike his partner who would do the same on his Camera. It annoyed him. He looked by his side. All his painting kit was intact.

About 1 hour later, the color of the sky started changing. His brother kicked him, "Get Ready!" and then prepared his Camera. He too jumped up from his seat and started rubbing his eyes hoping to clear of the slumber he was in a few seconds ago. As the colors brightened outside, the painter had already drawn the outlines of his scene. The Photographer was further ahead making strange poses. The painter wondered to himself... 'these Camera guys lack imagination.' The clouds started covering the horizon, much to the painter's annoyance and to the Camera man's delight.

But what was amazing was when they looked at each others results in the afternoon. The Painter thought the pictures turned out better than his painting. And the Camera man thought that his painting had more depth than his pictures. Being egoistic pigs that they were, neither accepted this fact openly but kept their secret admiration to the other's work within themselves.

================

P.S - Ah... well... or so was the story. I imagined myself as the painter though :P And I've put the so called "Painting" up now...

Hiatus?

Long long time ago, I said I will never rant about any of my personal problems in my blog.

Today, I won't rant as well :P

Well. I haven't posted anything on my blog since December (which I don't know is a long time or not... ) but the only reason (and it's valid as well) was because my final semester kept me more preoccupied than I thought it would. Well, now all that is over, and once again in 5 years I'm at a cross road in my life. Even though I have decided which path I want to finally take, there is always this insecurity about oneself that make you look back at the other turns of life and wonder... "Is this the right way?"

For starters, let me tell you what I've been doing these last 6 months...

1) Learning - Lots of Graphics Software. From 3D modelling and animation suits to (so called simple) stuff like Photoshop and Illustrator.
2) Planning - My way ahead in life... It kinda sucks when you realize you still have an year of two of studies left...
3) Discovering - Myself. This was probably the toughest thing I did in these 6 months. I realized that though I had potential for Electronics and stuff... I really didn't enjoy it. So, that one road of the cross road I won't take.
4) Writing - A diary. I took out that diary after some 5 or 6 years. When I read what I had written in the past, I was amazed how depressed I used to be. Sometimes I still am, but no to that level. Anyways, that diary was once again filled with some of my most negative emotions. And now that I think about it, I kinda understand why do I feel so insecure in the first place about my future... :-/
5) Drawing Pads - This time, for my birthday, I requested a Stylus/Drawing Pad that I could use for cell shading and sketching directly to my computer. IT'S FUN :D :D :D

Well, that sums up. I haven't really given up or dropped my music domain yet. But it's true I'm not making too many tunes now... I'm now more focussed on my Graphic Skill, something that I've genuinely begun to enjoy doing now :)
I hope to make wonderful things that I can post in this blog... but for now, I'll only be able to post my trials, experiments and mistakes... :-/

P.S - Ah. I forgot to mention. The new background in my Blog is the fruit of my new skills in Photoshop :) This (Unnamed) Blue Planet has been made from scratch thanks to a wonderful tutorial available on the internet.