Yonkoma 3 - Friendship

So here is the 3rd 4koma. Very nice i think, better than the second one. This one took a while to to edit actually. Maybe i have better eye now, after doing the previous ones, after a very very long break from any sort of work with images. Moreover i am using Fireworks MX because i dont own Photoshop Orz. PS would make this so much easier and nicer. Well i am saving up and soon i will buy CS3 or maybe CS4. Anyone tried both and have seen a great difference? The latest version I worked on was CS2. I dont want to switch to CS in Flash tho. Learning action script 3 will be a pain in the ass. AS2 should be enough. Plus there are tons of veteran designer using AS1 right?

Back to talking about the 4koma. The idea for this one came to me at work while i was talking to one of my co-workers. It was gonna be red ranger and turtle ranger at first, but when i was coloring it in, i decided i wanted to keep it B&W, so i made him grey ranger. Just thinking about it makes me crack up lol.

Yonkoma 2 - Discovery

So here is the second 4koma, called Discovery. It's kinda about that activity that many young little fellas indulge in lol. I don't think this is nearly as interesting or funny as the first one, but it still makes me chuckle, especially the closing line. It's even better when that line in isolated. Imaging changing in a fitting room in some store, and then hearin "It's sticky afterall, huh?" from the next room? Makes your imagination tickle, ne?

For this one i used a 0.05 Prismacolor Fine Line Marker (in bold, for irony). Thus the line are way clearer and more accurate compared to the first one. I can even make it look like it was inked, if i try really hard, but since this is a gag 4koma i didn't really want to. I want to get an actual ink-pen some day.
I really prefer drawing on paper rather than on the computer. However i do all the tones and text bubbles on the computer. Right now i don't have photoshop, so i have to use Fireworks, which obviously makes it way way more time-taking. I am saving up for a better video-camera at the moment, and the next purchase after that will be photoshop. WOOHOO!

Yonkoma 1 - Dreams

Here is another 4koma ^ ^. I drew this one at home and had plenty of time (as opposed to when i try to draw in 15 minutes for my classmates in school), and resources (ruler, paper). I had the idea of saying "I want to become a giant robot" when i grow up for a long time, although my original idea was slightly different (i want to become a high-class prostitute lol). The guy who tells him to give up is a combination of Sexy commando, Vegeta and of course Freddie Mercury. I didn't mean to do that, but it somehow just sprang from my mind ^ ^. Anyway, thats it for now.

Don't give up kids!

I don't know

I bought this thing yesterday. I don't know why...

Gag manga

Here is another little piece of manga i made. This is also somewhat bizzare. Actually this definitely plays up to the gyagu manga genre doesn't it? All my manga strips and etc. are like that, and a lot of my conversations end up in that stream, if i am in a good mood that is. I really enjoy this kinda humor. Now for some interesting facts.

Kyosuke Usuta

The gyagu manga genre, or ギャグマンガ, is in existence primarily due to the existence of Kyosuke Usuta (うすた京介). Most famous of his works would be:

- "Sexy Commando Gaiden Sugoiyo! Masaru-san" (セクシーコマンドー外伝 すごいよ!!マサルさん)
A totally bizzare and hilarious manga. The story is about Masaru, a student who has perfected the Sexy Commando technique, and his friends who form a Sexy commando club. I find the story hard to explain because it's so crazy and because i haven't read the whole thing yet (^ ^);>. It was serialized in Shounen Jump Weekly (週刊少年ジャンプ) from 1995 to 1997. You can read some here.



- ピューと吹く！ジャがー (Pyuu to Fuku! Jaguar)
This one is about Kiyohiko, who is a pretty cool young man dreaming to be a great guitarist. However when he meets Jaguar his whole world kinda goes astray. Jaguar is a crazy character, and the manga features a lot of nonsense type of jokes. It is still being serialized in Jump, and started off in year 2000. I like this one better that Sexy Commando, but then again i haven't read it to the end so my judgement is invalid. Check it out at this link.


-武士沢レシーブ (Bushizawa Recieve)
I was not able to find this one on the net in english, and didn't even try to in japanese because i know i wouldn't be able to read it. BUT, i can say that it was serialized in Jump Comics in 1999. Since there is none on the net i am guessing this was not good enough to reach english audiences. But its uber amazing nonetheless probably. Plot summary will be coming soon and i will also try to get my hands on this one somehow.


Now that you have some understanding of what gag manga is (not understanding might be more appropriate though (^ ^) ), i present you a two page sketch, GOOD DAY FOR MARRIAGE DAY (read from top right to bottom left):

Ясау

Ясау is a short film i made a little while ago. Ясау (pronounced as YA-SAW) means making in Tatar - my native language. This is the second short i've made, and its the better out of the two. I'm working on another one right now so that will be coming up in less than two weeks.



This film didn't exactly work out how i planned. There are some mistakes in the editing, and the last scene was not shot the way i intended it to be at all. But the cameraperson was cold and was wearing a mitten, so thats probably the cause.

CREDITS:

Bulat Nugmanov (aka buratto, or hachi, myself) - Director, writer, cinematographer, and stars as the silent film narrator (the guy with accent), and the "bastard" in the stills sequence.

Marco Visconti - an extra, the guy with shorter brown hair, stars as silent film narrator's friend.

Amy Wincott - the cameraperson, stars as the girl in the stills sequence.

Eugene Chau - stars as the guy in the stills sequence

The only music used in the film is a soung called "Al Bada el Manboub" and is by Kalthoum, Oum.

Manga recommendations

So i decided to review and recommend my favorite manga titles. My preferences are usually something seinen and slice of life-ish. But good old shounen and romance mangas like DragonBall and Ichigo 100% sometimes tickle my fancy too.

So this week's manga is called Saint Young Men, or 聖☆おにいさん in Japanese (sei oniisan), and is by Hikaru Nakamura. Oh btw isn't it better to use the last name (in this case Nakamura) first rather than the first name, is it? I live in Canada now but where i come from originally the family name always comes first, as it does in Japan. And i dunno what the kanji is for the name but its most likely 中村光.

Anyway, the manga is about Buddha and Jesus who come back to earth to live human lives. And of course they come back as cool and slack young men, just as lost in the big city as a regular not so holy young person. The manga describes their lives and has a very sense of humour and is very light-hearted overall. It reinvents old characters of Buddha and Jesus and gives them a modern face that everyone can sympathize with. Needless to say religious fanatics might not enjoy it. However its important to overcome that kind of virtual boundaries and narrow-mindedness, and to be able to see old things in new ways. Since it's set in Japan it also tries to strengthen the cultural bridge between Japan and the West. I am not a member of any religion, although i am sort of spiritual and often question myself, and thus might be agnostic. So my view is different from someone who has been going to a church every sunday and reading the bible regularly or going to a monastery and praying to buddhist gods since their childhood, or whenever. I am going into dangerous grounds now i feel, and might have said that will upset some, so sorry.

Give this manga a whirl, and i am sure you will enjoy it! Only 4 chapters are available in english on the net tho which sucks. A good place to read it would be One manga which has a lot of titles for free online.

Let's go honey-hunting

A little manga strip i once drew in english class ^ ^. Enjoy (you have to click the image below to see the whole thing):

Intro

Hi everyone!

My name is Bulat and i will be starting a blog here and now. RIGHT NOW.
I have attempted blogging before, but i always used to get bored of it. Now that i have more interests and more things happening in my life i hope to have something to write regularly.

I am a 17 year old high-school student in my last year, a very easy-going and lazy and slack introverted guy with his head in the clouds.

Speaking of interests, i am really into music of all kinds. I play guitar and some piano and do some composing on trackers. Some of my posts will feature some songs i make or things relating to music.
Another big interest of mine is art. I paint and do digital arts and mixed media. So ofcourse i will post some of my creations and link to cool things and sites.
When i am bored, which is a lot of the time, sometimes i draw little manga strips. So i will feature those too.
I also love film, and especially Asian film. I make shorts so i will post on that topic too.
I love many things that relate to Asia besides film, such as manga, japanese language. I am a huge japanophile actually. And i plan to go into East Asian studies in university.

So thats what this blog will be about besides anything else that might pop into my mind ^ ^.