27.4.23

Learning 3D Modeling!

 


My first AI generated normal map in Blender
I am working on this while I am in Mexico chilling at a Yoga retreat. 

Also taking some VR sculptures and reducing the vector points so I can use them in this scene. It doesn't seem too big but one of the constraints I am working with on this scene is it has to be under 10 mb for the entire scene. One flower is 10 mb on its own, so I gotta crush ittt


Too much chrome? Or never enough

It is day 3 of the yoga retreat and I want to live in Mexico. Maybe I'll try to convince my mom to buy a house with me here! Better than renting forever in Ottawa. 


Alright, here is what I came up! With such limited time, learning a whole new medium and under 10MB's, and at a crazy yoga retreat. See you in Toronto May 18th!! 






14.3.23

2023-05-14

 Had a really crazy week! I've been working on Rococo's Garden (code name for my next game) with Amine and Ashley and we've had some really cool ideas. I am just so grateful that I get to world build all day, seriously a dream come true!!

I am also so proud to see Songs of the Lost get nominated for an Amaze award 2023, super cool!! Looks like I'll be coming to Berlin. We were nominated under the Diversity category. I feel a little weird about that honestly, being mixed race has nothing to do with why I make games. I guess it is impossible to separate? Also the team is indeed surprisingly diverse LOL I literally never even noticed. We have 2 Mexican mixed race women writing and making art, a Japanese man programming, a black woman making music and an Indian man doing game design. 

I did choose my collaborators because of our shared experiences, Ashley and I work so well together because we have very similar backgrounds and have similar questions about our place in this world. Almost all of my most successful collaborations have been with diverse creators, probably because we understand each other easier. Anyway, I'll take this nomination like a shot of tequila! As my mama likes to say, "It's good for you". I am genuinely over the moon that Songs of the Lost is getting some recognition, we love what we created and are really excited to see the characters return in our next games. Our first nomination as Apocablyss Studios!!!!! YAY. Stay tuned <3 


^ Me chillin at my cool Montreal loft.
Some life drawing sketches from the last few weeks!!! 











23.2.23

Something from the present

Blogs!!

I almost totally forgot about this blog. I used to blog so religiously when I was just getting started with my art career, I will try to do that again, at least for a while. It's a great way to journal for the future!! I'm so glad I went with Blogger and not Wix or whatever!

I've been listening to the White Pube and they were talking about how RSS could be the future of consuming art and I was like, YES! The come back of Blogger. I feel so exhausted by Instagram these days, I've never been this hooked by something that wasn't a cute boi. I even started using ads, who am I!!

Anyway, so my life has twisted and turned into funny shapes since my last post. I moved to Nova Scotia for a stint and had a really beautiful and strange time. It's kind of embarrassing, but I went there to get to know my mostly absent father and spent the greater part of the pandemic in one of the most beautiful and haunting places I've ever been - Lunenburg Nova Scotia. I had a small 1950's fisherman's house all to myself with tons of yard space and some of the most glorious sunrises of all time. The town used to have 4 grocery stores at one point, but now it only had an art shack open to tourists for 3 months a year. 

At first I didn't know how to drive which was brutal because Blue Rocks was an hour an a half walk from the closest grocery store in Lunenburg. I had some of the most awkward and comforting bonding moments with my dad driving me to the pool and teaching me how to drive. 

I did my first residency with the Lunenburg School of the Arts, created a few paintings which I am still getting the hang of making, below is an image of a quick patch job with moss that actually turned out alright? I had accidently gotten glue all over the frame a day before the show and was like, I'll cover it in moss!!! Moss makes everything better 👀




 Here is a link to the animation I created https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=BFBPqkMehCg&t=13s





Dreams - from 03/10/21

I have so many dreams! I remember almost all of them. At the risk of being an open book to any dream psycho analyst's out there, here are a few of my latest. Tell me what you come up with, dear analyst.

I had a dream you could plant the seed of a face tattoo and watch it grow

I had a dream I was with a family and had the sensation of being there by force. A stern woman, obviously head of the family, was making a holiday feast according to strict instruction with everybody's help. A woman with a baby appeared and screamed that someone had just died on an elevator and handed me a book on "Balance". Suddenly a cockroach crawled out among the food and when I noticed it, pulled out a feather from behind its back and started doing a dance. Suddenly I was falling through layers of floors (it was I that died in the elevator I suppose). The feast has been prepared and I am back at the buffet hall. The food looked amazing but I knew it wasn't real somehow and something sinister was going on. I grabbed a cheesy shrimp and was about to eat it when a girl appeared. She said she was the one that died in the elevator and that the house is haunted and nothing is what it appears to be. Suddenly the entire family was trying to bring a severed head to life. I was annoyed by the futility of this and suggested we feed the head ramen. Someone was disturbed by my suggestion then I woke up.

I had a dream that I was a part of some kind of contest with markers. The contest took place in an abandoned mall due to Covid-19. I asked the host if I could draw him and he completed my sentence and enthusiastically said yes. He looked like Vincent Price.

I had a dream I was testing lava. We were making crystals necklaces from lava we had on hand. I think I saw my ex and I was showing him my version of a design but he didn't like it.

I had a dream I was at an orphanage of some sort but we had a head mistress who we called "Mom". She ordered us to play crazy monkeys over and over again with giant monkey pieces and we were very frightened.

I had a dream I was at a lovely restaurant having dinner with a beloved friend but got up halfway through my dinner and left the establishment. I got in a cab and rushed to a man named Rodrigo who's gay lover had a package for me. He threw it out the window and I opened it. Turns out the package was a tiny starship that chased me in circles and shot tiny laser beams that felt like pellets on my skin. I ubered back to the restaurant but my friend had left and I felt sad. I suddenly had the urge to experiment with table formations and we sat at a Z shaped table (incoherent scribbles) the intercom said lunch is ready.

 I had a dream about a feeling that all of life was a web of strings that reached outwards. Actions can change them but they stay essentially the same. These strings unite us. I used sadness and all emotions equally to mutate us over hundreds of years. Sometimes I would be frozen and sometimes you would be a ball of nothing but outside sources will help lift you back out. This power was very cat like.

I had a dream that I skinned a robotic dolphin alive at this weird but very lit mansion party with other digital creatures. I guess I had accidentally sliced the dolphin and was now mercy killing them. The dolphin was actually made of dozens of tiny robot dolphins that all came spilling out

I recorded this one in a different way...
Interdimensional donut:
Save the citizens of the underworld. A young man (my ex) a young woman (me) and a mother (my mother) get stuck together in an inter-dimensional waiting room. The waiting room is blue and decorated with rainbow sprinkles. Some very sarcastic people show up and try to change the subject to themselves. The sound of their own voice is like 1000 orgasms floating in ethereal space with billions of tiny butterflies caressing their face with sugar dusted wings. Finally you get to ask about the sprinkles but the answer is unsatisfying. You have been brought here to write software for the Gods. My mother is concerned because she doesn't know how to code. "No worries, software for the Gods requires ones soul to do most of the work"

I dreamt I walked into a movie theater after the movie was done to take the left over popcorn. A guy came out and spoke to me, something about death. I realized I was holding several freaky looking guinea pigs so I let them go.  There was a weird machine in the theater that I plugged into my calf muscles for a while then went home. I opened my closet and remembered I had stolen many mannequins, one of them looked glorious, covered in jewels and colorful prints and an extraordinary headdress, she came to life and told me to focus on my purpose

Life drawing - A draft from years ago