Cartoon characters, comic strips and video games was the inspiration that started my pilgrimage as an artist, designing original stories and one-off comics about games both as a hobby and as a part time career. It was not until finally, after 10,000 years I claimed my own drawing tablet and creative software, exploring smooth vibrant motion graphics, animating my illustrations and learning advanced video editing! These two fields have made me grow to realise just how important the relationship visual and audio design is, they are truly the Yin and Yang of any media outlet!
My eye is always drawn to the wacky and colourful, both in style and execution. I adore game franchises like the Persona series, as menus, characters stats, equipment, basically any video game asset is portrayed using psychedelic and smooth transitions. The player will be looking at these details a lot when they play, so making them eye-catching is a great way to make the player feel more engaged with the game! Big colourful explosions from defeating an enemy to opening a treasure chest is a delight to see, adding impact to almost any action you make. I love settings in games and movies where fantasy and reality intertwine solely for the sake of being stylistic. Its such a fun concept seeing a Tarantino character break the laws of physics to exaggerate their coolness in that universe. Even background characters in Scott Pilgrim act with very little interest when a supernatural comic book fight breaks out, making that universe feel so weird and cool! Mixing the weird with cool is something I love approaching, designing the dynamic duet in my rhythm game with silly colourful costumes that contrast their amazing confidence and deadly skills in combat!
Even from a young age, sound and music is something I hold at the highest standard. I have an eclectic taste of music and enjoy soundtracks from mmaannyy different video games and films, ranging from large orchestral scores to small computer beeps and boops! Music is there to set your brain in the right mood, yet I also love sound that contrasts the tone, as it can conjure completely different interpretations of the visuals. Any style of music can fit any scene, and its up to the artist to decide what the meaning of that scene is. The main quality about music I love is its catchiness, as It keeps me thinking about that fictional universe for a while, particularly in videogames where music will repeat a lot. The main villains in my rhythm game are all jazz-themed, using jazz songs from the action-packed Space Channel 5 rhythm game to accentuate this fact for a comedic yet cool effect. Sound can enforce and alter the nature of the visuals; in my Bank Robbery animation the Magician summons a large hat to catch firing bullets yet the impact sounds are cork-screw opening plops rather than ricochet tears to make it feel like the hat has successfully prevented any damage at all. It also works very well in conjunction with comic book onomatopoeia, giving it a sense of accuracy to the sound playing while also complementing the overall cartoony aesthetic!