The Wonderland Project

I had the honour to participate in the Wonderland Project, a project that was about the well known novel "Alice in Wonderland" by Lewis Carroll (Charles Lutwidge Dogson). This project took place at the Shoe Factory by the Pharos Arts Foundation, on the 26th of November. The project was for a great cause and the money were given to children who suffer from rare illnesses. As part of the Wonderland Project thirteen internationally renowned composers were initially commissioned to write short pieces, each inspired by a different chapter, to be performed in order so they follow the story's narrative. Subsequently, the Pharos Arts Foundation in collaboration with the International Motion Festival Cyprus held a ‘Call for works” where 13 different solo/teams of film-makers / animators from all over the world were selected, out of 127 applications, to create films corresponding to the music of each chapter. And one of those teams, was our team (including me and my friends Georgia, Mike, Iraklis and Fanouria). We created something really beautiful in my opinion (and I don't say that really often about something that I have worked on)! What was really amazing about this event was the live music that was performed by Ashley Wass (piano) and Matthew Trusler (violin). It was such a pleasure working on this project and seeing the diversed result of it that succesfully married music and film!

RUN

Hello everybody, remember me? :p I know it's been a while since my last post but I have been busy dealing with some issues of mine. So this is going to be a rather depressing post, sorry for being the party pooper. :p More specifically, this post is about depression itself. As some of you people might already know, I am a victim of depression and anxiety disorder, two really torturing (in my opinion) mind illnesses that can really mess your mind up. To make things more clear, let's say depression is like not caring about anything (depression is actually a lot more than that) and anxiety is like caring too much for everything (again anxiety comes in lots of forms and it can be experienced differently by each one of us). So imagine having both of them, it's like hell! At first I didn't want to get out of bed and you could see a whole pile of dirty dishes next to me because I didn't want to get out of bed, not even to eat with my family. Then I started feeling sad about pretty much anything, I started being irritable to everyone around me, getting angry and crying for the stupidest reasons, and then panic attacks started occurring more and more frequently (that was the worst part). Long story short, I have been dealing with these issues for more than the last 2 years and I finally tried to do something about it a few months ago when I started taking medication, which helped me, made me feel okay for the most part. But I stopped a month ago (that’s another story which I won’t talk about right now) and the ugly thoughts didn't hesitate to come back. This post is about me, trying to take a huge step out there, admitting my problem to the world leaving myself vulnerable for you to see. And people, know that when a depressed person does that, to admit their problem, it is a VERY difficult thing for them to do! For example, in my case no-one believed me and that was my biggest fear! My friends and family were saying stuff like "you're fine, you just need some rest" (after a whole day doing nothing else but sleeping), or "you just need some vitamins and some food and in a couple of days you'll feel better", or "you're fine, sometimes I feel sad too but then I think about what's really important and I focus on thinking positively". A person with depression cannot just simply stop thinking about negative things. Negative thoughts become you when you are depressed, feeling sad is not just an emotion is your daily routine! How can you think positive when there is no reason at all to feel sad, or angry? Then come the bad thoughts which I admit, those really are negative thinking because you cannot stop yourself from thinking about your death and the people you are going to leave behind. And yet wonder, would it be better if you were just gone, vanished, would anyone even notice? I think that was the worst part for me, because it is at times like these that you need your close ones and it felt like everybody abandoned me, but eventually they understood that this was a big problem (and a real problem) and I had their support. This post is not about me crying or acting like a baby about my problems, I'm not trying to prove that I suffer from these illnesses or make you feel sorry for me. I want to reach out to people, friends or even family that might be facing the same or similar problems and tell them don't let it kill you! You are more than that! I am not going to tell you that is going to be easy, I know it's rough but things will get better! Talk to somebody about it, even if they don't understand you at first (which they probably won't, unless they already experienced depression), friends and family are always there for us and eventually you will feel better about it! Just have patience, that's all. You are not alone and there are lots of us out there, some of them don't even know that they might have depression yet. Did you know that GAD (Generalised Anxiety Disorder) affects 6.8 million adults, or 3.1% of the population? Quite a lot right? You can also visit a therapist or a psychiatrist, get medication, talk about it, keep a journal, anything that works for you really. Just make sure you fight it and you get it out of your system! That’s all, I really hope you liked my illustration and post because I tried really hard for this, to make this illustration and write about my problem, expose it for the whole world to see…

What the hell is multimedia design?!

This is a question that I’m being asked regularly, since I’m studying multimedia! Every time when it happens to be a family reunion or something like that (Christmas & Easter Holidays for example), I'm asked this question by at least 1 uncle/aunt. I don’t know if this happens only in Cyprus, but it happens A LOT!
“So what is multimedia design?”, an aunt/uncle pops the question, and then magic happens: everyone nearby that overheard the question starts guessing. And guess what?! They’re all wrong! Even my parents that should know this are guessing it wrong! I hear something like “But how could you not know what multimedia is?! OMG the word says it itself: it’s the media”. All of a sudden my profession became "the media"! Which I really hate because who doesn't hate the media? So, another one would add “Is it social media”? NO! I did not create Facebook or anything like that, although that would be kind of cool. Then is the part when my dad gets in the conversation and says “She makes websites and stuff like that” and my mum adds “No, no, no, she scans 3D models, don’t you remember, she was working at this job...” Yes mom, exactly! That was 1 job! My profession doesn’t depend on 3D scanning or 3D printing!
To sum things up, there are lots of guesses! But what is multimedia design, you might ask yourself! The thing in Cyprus is that no one will let you speak. Someone might ask something and then everyone starts yelling in your face! They don’t talk or speak, they just yell. Because that’s how we make conversations in Cyprus tongue emoticon So let ME answer this question for once! According to everything I know by now, this shouldn’t even be this hard if you can understand human language tongue emoticon I mean, come on! The word is Multi-Media! This means that this profession contains various media such as audio, video, pictures, text, web content etc. and may be combined with interactivity. Truth is, I’m not studying something specific! It’s a little bit of everything with a more artistic perspective! The most difficult part is when they start confusing you with graphic artists! I am not a graphic artist, I respect graphic artists but this is not what I am! And if you still don’t get what multimedia is, here is a more specific definition of it: "Multimedia refers to content that uses a combination of different content forms. This contrasts with media that use only rudimentary computer displays such as text-only or traditional forms of printed or hand-produced material. Multimedia includes a combination of text, audio, still images, animation, video, or interactivity content forms” (taken from wikipedia). See?! Even wikipedia knows it!
So this is what I have to deal with every time I’m asked this question! Are you having problems when you’re asked to explain your profession?

Experimenting

I know that the few last posts I did were about illustration and digital art, so here is something different that I hope you will appreciate :) I am really grateful to my friend Iraklis for telling me about this amazing technique that I'm sure you'll be able to do if you have a DSLR camera. So you just remove the lense from the body of the camera, you flip it and voila! Your ordinary/normal lense is now a micro lense and you can capture the little details that you previously couldn't because your lense was ordinary/normal :p You must be careful though because the focus is a bit tricky. So if you want more control you can use a tripod. Here are some of my results.

Some of them are more experimental and it's like they have an aura :p I think this happens when the lense is not touching the body of the camera which allows light to come in between. I don't know if this makes any sense but this is what I'm talking about.

So I don't know if this is something that everybody already knew, I just got really excited and I wanted to share this :) I hope you like it 

Speed drawing-Figure gestures

I always wanted to capture the movement of the human body, always trying to make illustrations based on real gestures but I was a bit naive thinking I could do it without practising first. So after lots of frustration I figured to try making some quick sketches with the help from images for reference. At this point I have to thank my dear friend Georgia for introducing me to these amazing figure drawing videos in youtube that have a timer for every pose. So some of the above sketches have been made in 1 minute and some of them have been made in 10. I used my graphic tablet to make them (wacom intuos), because I find it easier to work this way. So these are the results of my work unter the presure of time :p

Lizard-man

This was inspired by a tv show that I'm watching, called "Face off". The designs of the contestants are simply amazing so I thought "why don't I create my own monster"? And so I did. I had a huge difficulty drawing the hand. At this point I have to thank my awesome boyfriend for doing the hand-model for me :p (I really need to take some live drawing lessons again). The tail was difficult for me to draw too, I didn't have a model for that though because my boyfriend doesn't have a tail (shocking)! All in all I don't know if I like it yet because I got frustrated while doing it. Maybe you like it though :p 

Demon

Hello there! I finally finished this concept art that I came up with a week ago. I wanted to do something different from the other illustrations that I usually do just to test my skills, so I figured a demon is definitely going to be different! But I'm pleased with it. It has been actually really fun making this because I just got my first graphic tablet (wacom intuos) and I am sooo happy! There hasn't been a day that I didn't use it :p So no more drawing with a trackpad! I can make digital drawings properly now! I really hope you like it. It would be great if you followed my blog, leave a comment or share this post on Facebook, twitter etc. See ya :)