Knowing Kin Sun
Last Tuesday was the unusual meet with the legendary Kin Sun (KS) for a sharing session with me class of IL091-1 (though according to shirou_ohsakura, these sort of thing only happens in the 3rd year...).
And I was pretty much in fear and also in awe of him, after the *cough* past incident of throwing me out of his class after "illegally" entering. LOL.
But just after that ONE session with him, all my past perceptions of him is gone.
So yeap - I'm no longer afraid of him.
In fact, I think he's one of the saner and nicer people around, if I wanna compare to the eccentric John Hup and crazy Tommy.
When he started, he told us everything about the current industry - that from games to movies to advertisting to heck, comics, we as illustrators are quite needed in the field.
Then he started to talk about his life philosophy - and here on that is starts to get quite interesting, for he peppered it with his direct-and-real-to-life anecdotes, and he managed to get quite a riot of laughter from us all.
One of those memorably funny advice, and the one I'm most fond of, was the part about working.
In his words as best as I can remember:
"You think working is supposed to be fun.
Well, technically it should. For if the work is not fun, then you wouldn't enjoy it - and it become something not fun anymore.
(example). Like doctors. Doctors do what?
See sick people.
And they see sick people EVERYDAY.
EVERYDAY, you know.
You think it's fun to see sick people ah?
Not me lor!!"
*cue laughter from the class*
Bwaha. 100% reasonable - and damn right. I didn't see that in his angle XD;;; He truly has enlightened me.
Which also reminds me of another point he'd make about working:
"Take for example the animator. You think animator job also fun ah?
Everyday is build build build 3D model only.
Build---build---build - isn't it just like labour only?
But we as illustrators - we do more. We imagine.
We are just like film directors - we have to know everything, in order to control everything."
----
"People always think that illustration is just like that - drawing only.
Well, let me tell you.
Illustration - art - is much better than design. You know why?
Design, you have to follow local culture, follow what is given in that surroundings.
With illustration - wherever you go, you can always apply your skill.
You (can) go to Hollywood - you can work in animation or movie studio.
You (can) go to China - you can work in agency.
You (can) even stay in Malaysia and do whatever you want.
That's why illustration is much more flexible than any other course."
----
The second best one that he talked about, and really had me laughing everytime I think of it is when he talked about "the type of people that shouldn't take illustration."
Sure, he did tried to scare us all in the beginning, when he started off with, "If you can't handle what I'm gonna say about this course, or you can't take the pressure, then this course is not for you." But after saying the whole thing and something more, we all relaxed - for well, WE are all in this, and it's our passion that brought us here, and if we live true to our passion, we're never gonna leave until we're done sweeping the battlefield in red >DD
Anyway. There's something that KS highlighted about people and this course.
(note: KS has his, erm, personal opinion about accountants and architects AND designers, but I believe if he knew the truth, he would have changed his mind. So to trirose, don't take offense to what he said - though I do support you to smack him by all means >D)
"The people who cannot take my course, is people with the left brain.
You know, those people who wants everything proper wan - like lawyer lar, accountant lar, architect lar...
I (can) ask them to draw the head - yes, they can.
I (can) ask them to draw the two eyeballs - yes they can.
But the moment I say "turn the angle of the head a bit" and ask them to draw THAT, they can't do it. Why?
Because their brain cannot process that.
Their brain can process the hard fact only - the one in proper order. Anything else they cannot already - they cannot imagine. That's why I say this course is not for people who use more of the left brain."
Well...
Um...
Technically, in the past during my secondary school days, I'm more left-brained - which explains my capability to do maths and accounting like pie XD; And subsequently suck in the art subjects (because my drawings of humans don't even resemble anything humanoid...)
Then when I enter TOA, my brain slowly got to use more of the right side - and still a bit of the left, for Interior Design demands accurate calculations and translations from feet to metres and vice versa =w=;;;
Into the UK, my right brain went bust / got overloaded with new sensations and new exposure to what is truly art and design - and then, um, the right brain had a tussle for moar territory space with my hapless left brain (which explains my straaaaange decision to suddenly draw fanart in the midst of a HUGE ongoing project - it's a sign my right brain is staging a direct rebellion onto ma soul XD;;;)
and um, well, looking at where I am now - I can safely say that the right brain had a pretty successful revolution and overthrew my left brain XD;;; And that now my right brain commands moar powar than left brain - left brain hafta listen to right brain first before doing anything =w=;;; WHICH explains why I have been pretty rebellious of late.
Right now, I have the best of both brains - at the very least, I still retain my calculations/accuracy skills, but I'm slowly but surely (re)building my art sense and gaining better drawing skills than the few years before.
So really......if Kin Sun woulda discover that a LEFT-BRAINER-1st a.k.a. yours truly had joined his course, he's gonna eat his words >DDDD
(but Wait! There's JL too! She IS DA LIVING PROOF that left-brainers CAN still take illustration and not suck as badly.
HAH!!! KS should eat his words!!!~~~~~LOL)
----
On a better note, he also talked about how lucky we all were for learning how to draw the Drew Stuzan style in just 3 years.
"You know ah, those kwai loh in their countries, they have learned art at a very young age. At age 5-6, they already know who is Michaelangelo, who is Da Vinci. Then at age 18, they finally go into their major (course of Illustration). So in total, they have more than 18 years of experience in art.
YOU ALL AH, you all only come here to TOA at the age 18. SO you all is start from scratch, zero. And only just start to know who is Michaelangelo, who is Da Vinci.
Yet in 3 years' time, if you hardworking enough lar, you can already draw as good as the Drew Stuzan style.
You know HOW MANY YEARS Drew Stuzan used to study to get to where he is right now?
Definitely not in 3 years like you all lor.
So you all are quite lucky, and should be grateful that you can know how to draw like the masters in such a short time."
----
Other than that, he'd pretty much spewed his life stories, and then proceeded to show us his works - which I'm pretty much accustomed to, like his Fung Wan works, Batman, Liberty Prison (his own comic!), etc. And some new ones like his character designs (!!!) and various illustrated ads.
Oh, and he also showed us his "sucked" work.
I was like, w00t, even the legendary KS has sucky work???? I DON'T BELIEVE IT MAAAAAN. If he can even consider some of his own work as sucky, then I don't know how/what we can consider ours =w=;;; (uuuhhhhhh, no wonder he was forever crit-ing people even if the people is born genius/ born talented/ yan choi/ really talented =w=;;;)
But yeah, his sucky work was this ad he did for a Vietnamese drink - and the client wanted the bottle to be RIGHT in the middle, and two heroes running from this huge crocodile. And those background/heroes/crocs CANNOT block the bottle. Oh, and the client wanted it Drew Stuzan style.
KS's preliminary ideas are real good. SO GOOD. Despite being mere outlines.
(though he "half-cheated" by using scans/screenshots of actors Indiana Jones and heck, Rocky!!! to draw using his Wacom Tablet - he even showed us the refs in his PSD file!!!)
But apparently, his client couldn't accept it - and was complaining why some the heads so big, why so many crocodiles, and the heroic couple (KS make 1 male 1 female) looked too romantic =w=;;;
So KS made some adjustments.
And through at least 4-5 different changes.
The finalized version was bad - all the people (left and right side of the poster) were the same size (KS's main gripe), the croc is left with one (and lonely by the side =w=;;;), and the entire artwork lost the texture-characteristic of Drew Stuzan.
In which KS made helluva noise about it. "WTH. They say dun wan the texture woh. No more texture means no more Drew Stuzan style lar!!! And THEN they say want that style in the beginning. WTH!!" Bwaha...
Then the client wanted it to be readied in colour in 2 days. KS said NO WAY, and asked for 3 days.
How he managed to do that job in 3 days? He told us his "formula".
He split the drawing into 2, and gave one part to Assistant A and the other part to Assistant B. Then when both gets done, he just checks them for errors, and merge them together via Photoshop.
And being a 2-man-3-day-job, the quality of the work slightly suffered - in comparison to the work he has full-control, like Liberty Prison. There's less details, but the overall colours are nice (and sucky composition, well, he can't change whatever the client wanted.)
And the best last part of it all, was when he talked about Tatsun >D
"You know my time ah, it's very hard to get Tatsun to demo for us wan.
When he demo to somebody, we always photostat that somebody's ref and distribute around the class.
And Tatsun only demo-ed to me ONCE.
You know what he demo-ed?
I asked him how to do a proper stroke / what is a stroke.
And all Tatsun did was....
*KS grabs a marker and scrawls/signs a random doodle-line on the whiteboard*
-just do this, and he say, This is how you do a stroke lor!"
And the whole class was thrown into an uproar.
Naturally.
'Coz we definitely had not expect that Tatsun would just do a random line and call it a stroke.
But apparently, according to KS, that's what he's done XD;;;
At the very end of the session, he took upon a more serious tone, and started talking a whole load of things of what to do - and claimed he ain't as good as right now, but that he learnt from books and learnt from his friends ("Friends are your greatest inspiration!"), only to reach the level he is right now. By being hardworking, and looking at masters' work and references/tutorials, the normal person can do just as great as the genius (here, he reiterate about the difference between genius and normal people - in that geniuses just do it faster, but eventually they reach the same point :D)
And that pretty much sums up what "chaos" KS has ordered during that session.
At the very least, I now know that KS ain't that scary anymore, and he's a pretty reasonable guy to be with - and kinda a direct/frank person.
But since he can't tolerate laziness, I shall do my best to finish up all his assignments and not be late for his class =w=;;;
For now, I need ma sleep.
And lastly, GOOD NEWS for Constance - yeap, parents have allowed. *^___________________^*
-L