Mini-class photo with our Graphic Design 1 teacher, Steve Lawler. He was really great and am quite bummed that he won't be teaching us next semester. He had that nice balance between being very chill and letting you do what you want but also giving Actually Constructive critique, you know? Apparently he's quite well-known as a design professional too but whoops, I didn't really know until very late in the semester (read: last week)

As much as I am really very addicted to trawling the Interwebz well, just because, it nearly always ends up with a new addition to my list of pet peeves. Which makes me an increasingly less pleasant person, I'm sure.

So, a new category of people that I would like to say SCREW YOU to: hipsters* posing in their nerdy/geeky-chic thick, black plastic frames acting all cute, hi seriously you look stupid. Just drop the act yeah, the whole oh look at me being all ironic and interesting because you know, I look like a nerd when in fact, I am totally ultra-cool.

Pisses me off! Maybe the whole falseness of it all is part of the "irony" but dude, you don't even have prescription lenses in them and god, they look like part of a costume - what costume? A nerd costume! And I tell you, genuine nerds out there would be embarrassed for you to be somehow unfairly implicated in the frivolity of your camwhoring.

Or maybe they wouldn't be bothered, too busy trying to save the world with quantum physics and all that. But you know who's still bothered? I AM!

Shut up, you make me feel embarrassed to be wearing my glasses for fear that I be considered a comrade in your culture.

And so, to offset the load of vitriol in this post, here's a bunch of really cool pictures gathered from here and there!

*Uh yeah, I kinda realize that this would actually include some of Genuine Friends, but aiya I still love you lot. I believe this is just a phase and our friendship! and love! will withstand this..thing! :D



.

Oh I am tingling with annoyance!

In my (small) school library now and 90% of the seats are being taken up by mugging students who aren't even from our school! There is a constant urge to say, HEY YOU NON-ADM PEOPLE WHO ARE YOU, USE YOUR OWN LIBRARIES PLEASE.

What what, art school kids are possessive and territorial.

The past few weeks have been increasingly mad in school. Every week, we think: oh god, this is the worst week EVER, and then we're acquainted with the next week. Anyway, having been putting up almost consecutive all-nighters this week, last night I prepared myself for another night/day of pushing my engine capacity!

As of last night till the present moment (5:49 PM), I have had:

• an apple
• one Brand's Chicken Essence
• one multi-vitamin pill
• one small bowl of awesome strawberry cereal with yoghurt drops
• one small cup of honey water (mother-mandated)
• one cup of tea from McDonalds
• two hash browns
• one semi-satisfactory meal from the malay canteen stall
• one crappy, tiny cup of diluted Nescafe mocha from the crummy vending machine
• a 20 minute nap
• one decent 400-word Asian Art History essay
• one highly informative Asian Art History presentation that was still torn apart by anal professor who leaped on every possibly generalized statement, thank you very much
• two rather okay drafts for the Nanyang Arts Festival publicity posters
• youtube that won't load :(
  

Would you have guessed that this was Boon Lay, Singapore! Gorgeous, and part of the reason why I really don't feel bad about staying in NTU. I really do think the campus is quite beautiful.

Eh I guess you might not be able to see the awesome colour due to the pictures being on the small side. Boo. So click the pictures to enlarge. At least one, promise! The light is amazing.

The morning light through the classroom screens was pretty today. I really love it when I wake up in bed to this subdued kind of light. Granted, it's not the GOOD MORNING, WAKE UP PLEASE kind of sentiment, but who wants that anyway! Ha. This kind of light is the kind that makes you feel soft and comfortable, a precursor to a gentle and thoroughly pleasant day.

I am stuffing my face with carbs now. In lieu of Proper Dinner, I am having the mini butter rolls that Gardenia comes up with, which are really very good actually.

I just got the letter from mendaki today which confirmed that I will not be heading off to london. I will be staying in Singapore where there is/are:
- sun
- cheap-ish food
- cheaper places to develop film
- full access to a dark room
- more than sufficient school facilities
- information and the know-how to get odd, strange materials* from the cheapest place possible
- friends
- a certain friend I've developed a very close working relationship that is full of potential for future ventures (crossed fingers)

Clearly, I am putting in a lot of effort to look on the positive side of things.

*Speaking of which, a recent project I was working on for school involved a friend and I having to do a presentation on a given designer (Zuzana Licko, who comes up with really interesting fonts, Mrs Eaves in particular..) as well as producing a souvenir for our classmates. Since Zuzana is famous for being a typeface designer, with a nifty name at that, we decided to showcase her fonts in the form of an alphabet block.

Which obviously meant we needed a source for the blocks of wood.

We were at first going to head to Ikea and cross our fingers that they would have building blocks in their children's department when my mum suggested instead that we source it instead from an industrial timber shop. Obviously something we should have thought of in the first place but I suppose the industrial backwaters of Singapore are not the first thing that comes to mind for a 20 year old greenhorn.

Although it should! Because for 24 2" cubes, we got it for what, $14. And the wood itself, a 8 foot plank of wood was 5 DOLLARS. Super cheap can!

Of course, we had to go through the trouble of finding a shop willing to sell us the measly amount that we wanted and then, the really nice workshop guy sawed the whole plank for us even though his boss told him only to saw through like half hoho! Avoided extra service charge! Am very pleased.

Also pleased with is how the project eventually turned out.






And here's the typography project that I mentioned in the previous entry! Charcoal on a huge-ass piece of craft paper, photographer with from the top bunk of my double-decker bed and Illustrator-ed to come up with a chart of the letter's anatomy hurrah. Uh, but this copy here is one with a mistake and some accidental omissions, like how the end of the stroke is just that and not actually a terminal? And I forgot to mark down the x-height. Such a noob.

FIRST DAY OF SCHOOL WAS AWESOME CAN?

We had Typography today, so we started off with a few basic exercises....like a freaking giant-scaled charcoal/paint rendering of a serif letter! If you've ever had to do a banner for tedious school activities, you know how tedious and difficult this is.



These are my classmates' stuff, my lowercase 'e' looks a bit lopsided because I couldn't the proportion and curves just right yet. Which makes how awesome the 'g' looks veryyy impressive indeed :D