little plastikk qube

Prism Loo

2010-11-07T00:24:00.002+08:00

Back to the basics - to design a low-cost toilet module for villages in Cambodia. Based on a hexagonal module so that the units can share walls to reduce costs further.

Chairs

2010-10-21T22:30:00.008+08:00

Came across these stacks of run-of-the-mill plastic chairs. Only on closer observation I realised how beautiful and economical the shape of the chair is - and how it is actually a single deformed surface that creates volume with its curves and folds. Then I also realised how the repetition and stacking of the shape creates beautiful textural forms.

Also made me think about how so many things are over-designed and tortured into form when sometimes the most amazing things are made when you just leave them the way they should be.

Rain and other Olfactory Nostalgias

2010-10-19T13:03:00.003+08:00

Hulking Desert Rig

2010-09-26T20:45:00.001+08:00

Split Lamp

2010-09-11T15:59:00.003+08:00

A single surface

A split

A twist

A light

DBS Workshop @ *SCAPE

2010-09-01T19:02:00.006+08:00

An entry for a competition to do a DBS bank branch in the youth mall *SCAPE. Did this entry with Colin - my perpetual competition buddy. Really happy with the product! The idea was to create 2 distinct spaces: a 24-hour Interface zone with ATMs, digital screens, media wall, and a transformable Vortex zone with a dramatic infomedia sculpture, and a typical banking area that turns into a cool classroom area for financial masterclasses.

Mute

2010-01-26T03:48:00.002+08:00

A constellation of cameras lights twinkle and a thousand lenses swivel and bulge
Pointed at me - the compound eye of an enormous dead fly.
I know this is the crucial moment to speak.
The final certain footstep
on the lip of the chasm before the leap.

I open my mouth, beaming.
And my smile soon collapses;
When I realise what I am:
mute.

Frozen Music

2010-01-02T23:33:00.003+08:00

I just found pics of this lamp thing that I did for an exercise in year 2. I think we were given 3 hours or so to conceptualize and make a lamp in response to a piece of music written for NUS' Centennial celebrations.

I think my approach was to not think too much about the music/concept and just make something NICE out of the plastic sheets we were given. Haha. And the bullshitting and post-rationalization came after that. And thinking about it some more, that seems to be my approach to a LOT of other projects.

Whack now, think later.

Air

2010-01-02T23:30:00.002+08:00

A few months ago I took part in the CDL Sculpture Competition ... and this was my entry.
The idea is to create a sculpture that inspired by the ground itself - half-earth and half-metal.
The name can be read in 2 ways: the English "Air" or the Malay "A-Ir" which means water.

Shingz-gapura

2009-12-28T23:09:00.002+08:00

Shingz-gapura, oh Shingz-gapura
Funny island, shat in the sea
Shingz-gapura, oh Shingz-gapura
Pretty flowerz boomz for you and me.

Stranded Play

2009-12-28T22:51:00.005+08:00

Just got a new camera.
I was REALLY tempted to get a mid-level DSLR and make my grand entry into the cult of the lens.. and decided that I'm really not the kind of person who would lug around a 1 kg camera and $3000 of photography equipment. Besides, I seem to have the strange mutant superpower similar to X-men's Jubilee - electronic stuff tends to self-destruct in my hands.

So lo and behold - shots from my NEW point-and-shoot Canon Powershot S90.

Cute, lightweight, and inconspicuous.

Childhood Miniatures

2009-12-28T22:44:00.002+08:00

A poster done for a friend's concert - inspired by childhood whimsy, toys, nursery rhymes and dreams...

Amazing UFO Structures in Singapore

2009-03-29T11:57:00.006+08:00

I was driving near my place when I suddenly came across these things that literally stop the car in the middle of the road, walk over and take a few pictures:

These gargantuan UFO things, about 6-8 storey tall, just emerged from this endless field of overgrown grass, with a little dirt road that scurried along the side. It's just absolutely surreal to see something like that in Singapore. I just wish I had better photography skills to capture these structures in their full glory.

Upon closer inspection, I realised they are water towers for some Newater storage facility. Where, you may ask? All I will reveal of their location is they are somewhere near a large furniture shop in the east. =)

Avatar of Vengeance RRWW

2009-02-24T22:09:00.002+08:00

4/3
Whenever you or a permanent you control becomes a target of an opponent's spell or ability, you may pay RW. If you do so, Avatar of Vengeance does 2 damage to target creature or player and you gain 2 life.

Vengeance: blind, blatant and bloody.

Avatar of Decay GGBB

2009-02-24T00:19:00.004+08:00

7/7
Flying
Avatar of Decay comes into play with three -1/-1 counters.
Tap, Remove a -1/-1 counter from Avatar of Decay: Each player sacrifices a land.

I imagine Decay to be a wispy female figure with a long rustling gown of skeletal leaves and wings of papyrus.
She is faceless, with only a beaked mask as her visage.
Her left hand is made of spotless, shiny steel, constantly twitching and squeaking - the only sound that she ever makes.

(Yeah I used to be a Magic cards geek =) )

Naturalization of My Personal Space

2009-01-28T23:49:00.003+08:00

Another fun activity I've been involved in: redecorating! Was thinking of how to create designer-looking stuff for my room at a fraction of the cost, while keeping in my favoured theme of nature-inspired forms. Here's some of my mini-projects. And yeah, I have kinda quirky taste sometimes.

Cactus Spine Lamp -
Made from $5 Ikea lamp and 3 x Polyetylene spiky mats to keep birds off surfaces (dunno what the hell is that called)

Foliage Frames -

White frame from Ikea and 3 different artificial grass tufts that I got from Daiso.

Monstera Clock -

I ripped out the clock mechanism + hands from an old obiang clock I've had for years, and cut out a Monstera leaf pattern (you know, those tropical ferns) out of Bristol board. Kinda like this one the best. =)

The Architecture of Archival

2009-01-27T11:38:00.006+08:00

Recently I've been intrigued by the language of archival and instruction, and the way that diagrams map out the complex organisation of the world. While the illustrator of the diagram seems to be engaging in a very scientific, methodical process, there is a subconscious point of view that is being reflected.

These are experimentations in digital collage: basically I stitched together a composite scene from images of a 19th-century illustrated encyclopedia, and an IKEA furniture assembly instruction manual. Both, to me, are forms of archival that pay specific attention to an object that evokes hidden worlds: the foreign exotic lands, or the idealised domestic realm of the catalogue home. These collages aim to unveil the hidden fairytales and scenes that have supposedly been torn apart by archival.

Enjoy.

Geological Shrines

The Budkeeper's Ritual

Happy CNY

2009-01-12T00:08:00.002+08:00

03:14:14:12:08

2008-12-15T00:43:00.003+08:00

Room of indeterminate length
A table that stretches into the thick darkness
Two endless rows of people I know and once knew
Sitting in a pregnant silence; Staring at the space before them.

As I move quickly to find my place
I see, between the shadows of their heads
Spheres of varying light that breathe luminescent
They stare unblinkingly at the radiant orbs that dance in the dark.

I find the only gap - a seat that is undeniably mine.

Five empty cards that lay neatly on a tabletop of velvety black.
A glance to my right and left: like the space between two mirrors.
I look at my cards
and I do as they do.
I breathe and I think and I concentrate.

And nothing happens,
and the stasis freezes into infinity.

Eklipse | Modular Seating

2008-10-18T01:17:00.003+08:00

It's been a long time! Just wanted to post a little project that I've been working on recently. It's a design of a modular public seating unit made of polyproylene that can be aperiodically tiled due to its shape, creating a seamless flexible seating surface that suits all spatial situations.

Here's a drawing of what I intended it to look like:

Comes in 3 shades that are (pretentiously) named after varying shades of shadow, as the name Eklipse suggests - Lumina (white), Penumbra (light gray) and Umbra (dark gray).

Here's a really badly taken photo of a great 1:6 prototype kindly cut by my really nice friend Guofeng:

Got my funding to do a life-size prototype of my design, so stay tuned for more updates!

Dripping The Darkness of Night

2008-06-28T01:45:00.002+08:00

Evisceration

2008-05-04T23:16:00.000+08:00

Thin Air

2008-04-28T21:01:00.002+08:00

Some time ago this very dark, twisted image came into my mind - a person being strangled by brightly-coloured balloons that take him high into the sky. Recall the Greek story of Icarus, the man who made wings out of feathers and wax, and flew so close to the sun that his wings melted and he perished.
Ambition kills us sometimes; sometimes you grow so blinded by the threads that hold together your success and your dreams that you hardly realise that those are the very threads that tighten around your neck and threaten to end it all.
And so the hypothetical voice of reason responds, "Cheemz sia. Wah lau why you so angst like wan to die die liddat?"
Errr... no idea man.

My Love and Hate of Architecture

2008-04-28T20:38:00.002+08:00

I randomly created this composition, and somehow felt that this really really embodies the love-hate relationship with what I study - Architecture.
It's something that grows and feeds on your energy like a parasite or a virus, yet there's something strangely compelling about it that you cannot tear yourself away from. If you were to ask me now, I think my relationship with the Big A would be quantified as:

48% HATE and 52% LOVE

I guess.

Postcard from the Mind

2008-04-22T22:00:00.002+08:00

It's been a long time since I've said anything in this space, and I've decided to break the silence with a snapshot of what's happening with me now - some things are best described wordlessly, and things that don't make sense sometimes are the things that are perfectly, crystal clear.

Just for your info, this collage started from a scrap piece of paper with my architecture design project in progress printed on it. I sort of stared at the thing for awhile, and I had this really really strange feeling looking at something somewhat familiar yet very foreign to me, like suddenly finding an unusual tree in the place where I unknowingly planted a seed long ago.

Kami Kami Kami!

2008-03-01T23:58:00.004+08:00

Remember the Kami Chair I posted about half a year ago? Here it is under construction, welded by my favourite uncle from Sam Seng Metalworks. This was such a painful project to execute, but I must say, at the end of it I feel the greatest sense of relief looking at it done.

So where is the final chair, you ask? Stay tuned to find out.. haha. The best things in life are earned through patience. Bleah.

Collage: Deep Dark Dirty Secrets

2008-02-08T02:33:00.000+08:00

Deep, dark, dirty secrets are the stars of the freakshow of life: when we hear one, it doesn't really matter who it's about or who it concerns. We gawk and marvel at the abominable beauty of the secret, the excitement of anonymous voyeurism, and the strange power of forbidden knowledge.

Stripped of their previous owners, here are 15 deep, dark, dirty secrets, sheared naked for your perusal. Fact or fiction - this would be up to your judgement. But be careful as secrets without origins, due to their inherent parasitic nature, tend to new owners to feed on...

1. I hate it that I'm fat.
2. I should have used a condom.
3. I cheated my friends of their money
4. I did it, and did it again until I was sore. I could not find a way to stop.
5. I get turned on by dirty socks.
6. Eating raw meat gives me a thrill.
7. I wanted to turn her gay so we could be together.
8. I killed the rabbit. I was curious about death.
9. When she broke up with me I took pills to end it all.
10. I cry myself to sleep.
11. I cheat in everything I do because I am incapable.
12. I hate her. She never told me I was adopted.
13. I stole the plastic dinosaur from the shop.
14. Not being able read or write hurts because I'm useless.
15. He touched me in a place that he shouldn't have.

Dreamscape 1

2008-02-02T09:54:00.001+08:00

I opened my eyes and found myself in a dim, open place that smelt of an unwashed cage. Above me were large, boulder-like objects that were held precariously in mid air by stilt-like legs, forming a space not unlike a crypt. The boulders seemed to be carved to resemble animals heads: birds, fish, cats, and many other strange creatures I knew not of.

Humming in an indiscernible pitch were clocks hanging from these mysterious boulders..

Haiku: Lost - Loss

2008-01-30T23:41:00.001+08:00

Loss

A valley so wide
The sparrow died; Trying to
Find its way across.

- Haiku

This is a post that has been waiting many many months to appear on the Little Plastikk Qube, but I'm just glad that I have found some time to continue with my entries.

This post is dedicated to all who has felt lost before, or an inevitable sense of loss. Sometimes, when things are down for you, what you need isn't really someone to cheer you on, to tell you things are better, to pick you up. Sometimes all you need is a quiet, white space in which you can mourn. A space where you can put down your heavy, heavy backpack for a moment, to stretch your limbs enjoy the vast emptiness and solitude, and eventually move on.

No, I'm not sad or feeling angst in life - I just feel a need for such a space in life.

A quiet nameless grave by the roadside, where anyone can sit down and think of what you have lost.

I hope I can provide this space.

The Elements - (in progress)

2007-10-19T09:28:00.000+08:00

木 / wood - Shop in Daikanyama, Tokyo

If you know me, you will know that I am Wood.

Wood dreams.
Young saplings that buzz with
Summer and spring, of revels in the almond sun
and all of creation in its cornucopia of
feathers, fur, flowers, fronds.
Beauty that comes with the price of fragility.

Wood bends.
Around immovable rocks, towards precious light,
swayed by the currents and vortices of the world.
Indeterminate, yet focused in its direction of growth.
Nobody can predict where
or when -
Things grow in a pattern that most do not comprehend.

Wood is inward.
If hurt, the forest closes itself to the blinding world,
With no reason.
With no exception.
A dark fort of black trees; leaves that blot light, matted branches that scar the sky.

金 / metal - Steel sculpture in Tokyo Midtown Park

汽 / air - View from 5th Station, Mt Fuji

土 / earth - view from 8th station, Mt Fuji

水 / water - Water Temple by Tadao Ando, Awaji Island

Toyrings - Acrylic Fashion Rings

2007-08-24T23:58:00.000+08:00

Toyrings is a product that my friend and I are working on at the moment. Although these rings are not for sale at the moment, be sure to drop a post or email me at kenkqb@gmail.com for information or even complimentary rings for friends and anyone who's interested to have a little piece of quirky fashion at the tip of his/her fingers. =)

Rift Lamp

2007-08-22T23:30:00.000+08:00

This is a lamp to be placed in the corner of a room, creating an illusion of a hole torn, and an expanding star-like object spanning the rift created.

7 other parallel dimensions are revealed through this rift.

The illusion is created with the use of 3 mirrors placed perpendicularly to one another.

"Kami" Chair

2007-08-15T09:41:00.000+08:00

Inspired by paper construction and origami, I designed this chair as an exploration of the structural and formal qualities of folding. Designed as a continuous loop of folding planes, the chair resembles a delicate paper construction that deforms slightly when one sits on it, creating a visual tension of strength and immateriality.

It will be made of powder-coated aluminium (white) with a continuous layer of black polyurethane foam on its inside face of the loop.

Blood House

2007-08-13T21:14:00.000+08:00

I've long had this idea of doing an ongoing comic strip, making use of 3D software to actually model out the scenes and places that the characters will be in. Once these iconic places are actually modelled out, I just have to move objects and place the camera as if with a dollhouse, basically capturing the scenes as I go along.

Of course what would be interesting is the design and feel of these environments. This is Blood House, possibly the dwelling of a predatory seafaring character; a location that eventually culminates in some form of hurt or murder. The idea is to have the lowering tide change the look of the house from inviting to intimidating.

The sad and weird thing is, I feel more excited about this 20-min architectural creation than my entire Year 3's work. I guess the disillusionment of the architectural profession is really setting in.

Lava and Polarity Mazes

2007-08-13T00:37:00.000+08:00

Ok... new maze concept!

1st one is just a normal maze for you to get warmed up.

The 2nd maze I call the Lava Maze. Basically the red squares are hot lava, which means you can only walk across a maximum of 5 red consecutive squares, after which you overheat and fry. Make use of the white squares as "rest stops", and be sure not to underestimate your travelling distance in the lava!

The 3rd Maze is the Polarity Maze. When you walk through a colour (pink/cyan) it charges you with the colour polarity (e.g. pink). You can no longer walk through the same colour that you are charged with (pink), but when you walk through another colour it charges you with a new polarity (e.g. cyan).

Enjoy.

New Photography Manifesto

2007-08-12T23:49:00.000+08:00

1. The Subject shall no longer be of primary importance; gone are the pictures of budget holidays and pseudo-artistic shots, gone is the capture of old people and shophouses and stray kittens and children laughing. Just as the representational paintings of masters lay dusty in galleries, these photos must lie in dust as well.

2. What is true and beautiful is Komposition, the balance of Lyte and Shadow, hyperrealism of Tex-tures, and evocative geometric Shapes. The photograph should be an ageless work of art.

3. Emotional response shall only be created by visual Tension and Release, and strategic abstraction of Shapes. Beauty lies in the simplicity of the image - in a world full of real complexities, visual art should serve to distill visual Beauty.

4. O! The beautiful Shapes of koncrete and metal, eroded by Nature's hand herself. Why should leaves and birds dominate our canvasses of light when Nature has chosen to lay her hand on Man's own built masterpieces.

5. Let us unite and march forth in a blinding future devoid of Photoshopped images, unidentifiable sunsets and tiresome blurry Lomographs. Let our destiny be one of purity and pristine Beauty. Let us embrace the New Photography of tomorrow, brothers and sisters of the Lens!

Blind Staircase

2007-08-09T12:50:00.000+08:00

Some people dream in monochrome,
some people dream in numbers or words,
some people dream in sounds.

My dreams are almost always hyperchromatic visions of deep colours, fringed with colours that serve to densify the bold colours. Even the sky seems a saturated liquid that flows endlessly through space.

I dream of places. Places I've been before, but twisted as if seen through a glass bubble. Curtains flap soundlessly in the invisible wind. Things that should be there are ripped from the world, leaving a silent void that maintains its boundary with the rest of the polychromatic world.

I dream of trains. Of parks. Of houses that I've stepped into before, but now as a helpless intruder.

I dream of people. The soft warm faces that I know and love, the transparent ghosts that shuffle through the maze of my life, the glowing seeds that are people who are yet to be.

I dream of a blind staircase, leading to a blind door.

30-sec Portraits of Idling People on the Train

2007-07-30T23:19:00.000+08:00

When you're on the MRT train and you're bored, one of the most entertaining things is to draw. And the most interesting subjects you could ever hope for are sitting right in front of you in a row, sitting still, engaged in their own little space, unaware that someone is watching them....

This really nice auntie sitting beside me peeked over to see I was doing and started giggling loudly once she figured out which people I was drawing. She then thanked me for making her laugh. Glad I was able to make a random person happy today. =)

"Woman With Pursed Lips SMS-ing Boyfriend"

"Big Hair, Big 'Phones"

"Dog Tags Are Macho"

"Immersed In Canto-Pop on My IPod"

"Uncle Turtle"

"The Seat Beside The Glass"

"PSP Boy"

"Momma's Mountains; Sista's Valley"

Fibrous Sticky Cocoon

2007-07-22T13:07:00.000+08:00

It's been a long time since I last updated this blog, mainly because of work and reservist training commitments. Thanks to those who regularly checked for updates here, and I promise more exciting content will be added in the near future.

We had an 2-day exercise which involved setting up a defence position in forested area somewhere in Marsiling. The thick jungle vegetation consisted mainly of large fruit trees like durian, jackfruit and rambutan trees, and we were tasked to dig shellscrapes or trenches in the ground in which we would sleep in. Very much like sleeping in a shallow grave, I suppose.

I lay in this damp hole in the soil, slipping in and out of consciousness as I struggled to sleep, the strange intoxicating stench of rotting fruit, the sounds of metallic rifle magazines clicking in the dark, and the texture of crisp leaf litter and moist organic matter brushing against my skin, the depthless freckles of light that streaked through the aged leaves of old trees, completely immersing me in a surreal, deeply tactile environment.

Call them visions, or dreams; these few images vividly surfaced in my mind as I sank further and further into a sub-conscious state of mind, a distorted reflection of the reality around me....

cilia on sticks
pustule-like, glistening like insect eyes
nowhere to shift without touching them

a heaving mass of scales
some brittle and skeletal
some black with age and decay

fibrous husk of tissue

like frozen muscle

deep scars that hide dark secrets

feathery antennae that bristle

that curl and wisp and fray

invade the crevices of your body

Don't Bottle Up Your Feelings...

2007-06-10T16:18:00.000+08:00

Bottle A: Darling, your eyes are gorgeous. They're so....clear and transparent.

Bottle B: That's because they're made of glass?

Bottle A: Errr.... your beautiful head is so.... shiny.

Bottle B: That's because my WHOLE BLEDDY HEAD is made of glass?

Bottle A: Well... I love your... transparency. And your... openness towards me. It's as if I could see right into you, into your beautiful, pure soul.

Bottle B: In case you haven't noticed you could probably see right THROUGH me. And that's coloured water by the way. Probably food colouring... you know.

Bottle A: Come, let me hold you tight!

Bottle B: You've got no frickin' arms.

Bottle A: Oh. Crap.

Teleportation Puzzle

2007-06-10T15:57:00.000+08:00

Care for a little bit of of cerebral stimulation?

This is a little invention of mine called the teleportation puzzle. Basically it's a grid of patterns which act as pairs of teleportation gates, and you need to get from the top left hand (entrance) to the bottom right one (exit).

The trick is, when u step into a gate, you immediately get teleported to a gate of similar pattern, and from there you choose another gate, moving only horizontally or vertically. So eventually u have to get teleported to the pattern at the bottom right, and then you exit.

Sounds easy? Try for yourself lor.

Sounds hard or don't get it? Just take it as just another drawing lor.

Saccharine Sweet Beach Babies

2007-05-28T00:11:00.001+08:00

This is more freakin' saccharine sweet than sugary caramel drizzled on strawberry cotton candy with colourful sprinkles on top.

Something I did, that is more lighthearted...and kawaii... I guess.

Someone call a dentist before I get tooth decay.

Azure Cavern Lake

2007-05-06T12:14:00.000+08:00

This is a digital painting that is still in progress, but I thought it would be interesting to share with you guys a little bit about my work process. First stage would the conceptualization stage, which usualy is a sketch using pencil, which might be inked in properly with .3/.5 pens afterwards, depending on the look. This time i'm going for a more "painterly" effect without the sharp outlines, so I just scanned in a very rough pencil composition.

The idea is a scene of a large underground lake, cavernous but with its own network of jetties and pendulous architecture hanging from the cavern ceiling, a bit inspired by the carved profiles of classical balustrades and columns. We see a protagonist taking in the whole scene, but I haven't defined him/her yet.

The next step is to paint the entire scene in a monochrome wash to establish all the darks and lights of the scene. This creates some form of depth and defines the main objects. Of course, this is done very quickly and intuitively so I won't get obsessed with filling in confusing details right at the start.

Now I establish the main colour scheme for the picture - a dark, greenish-grey look that makes the buildings look like they are carved out of jade. The only differering colour is a warm highlight in the corner, where an opening to daylight allows little sphere-copters to emerge out of the cave.

That's all for now, folks. Stay tuned to monitor my progress!

Metallic Cords Around My Head

2007-05-05T21:56:00.000+08:00

Cords.
They hiss and writhe around your torso
Metallic Medusa.
Warm eyeballs that freeze into directionless titanium ball bearings
Flesh that becomes cold plastic.
Diaphanous blood that now throbs through your body.

I watch silently as the transformation takes place.
Not thoughtlessly, nor painlessly.

Your body remains rigid while something in you
collapses
and dissolves - I can see it in your glazed visage.
Like a machine.
Little red lights and circuits that shut down at regular intervals;
You die a thousand deaths, whirring to a stop.
And I anticipate the silence that follows.

Part of me watches helplessly
As one would watch the disintegration of a massive glacier
Falling impossibly, slowly, majestically.

I wonder too about the ghost in your aluminium shell.

Aural Score

2007-04-26T01:28:00.000+08:00

An aural score is a written or drawn interpretation of a piece of music that cannot be noted in normal musical notation. This is a score I did as an assignment in a class, and the piece that this score corresponds to is definitely not your usual pitched music. It begins and ends with the sound of doors opening and shutting, noting the movements in the piece.

Each segment is a soundscape that depicts a scene - the 1st minute or so that you see in the score is actually the sound of a clattering carriage, which suddenly morphs into the sound of a city street in the dead of the night, with rain and soft traffic sounds.

Does music need notes and rhythm to be beautiful? I don't think so. Perhaps it's the little sounds that remind of you of a special place, the voice of someone, the comfort of the hum of your PC - things like these that become the music of life.

Japanese Assassin in Full Fuschia

2007-04-23T00:54:00.000+08:00

Some friends commented that I had this cutesy style that's quite recognisable so I decided to have a bit of fun and go out of my comfort zone in doing this one... Not much to say about this, except that: if I were to design a CD cover for background electronic music played during Japanese Cosplay events....this would be it I guess. Not that I really think there's a market for that kind of music...

On hindsight, when I'm free I'll probably do the following things to this:
1. make the stuff behind her more symmetrical
2. clean the lines up by re-drawing the whole assassin digitally
3. reduce the flowery stuff a little

But oh well... probably won't do it in the end....

Planar Burrows

2007-04-15T12:33:00.000+08:00

This is an idea that I will be working on in the near future, which may actually materialize into a physical product. Just to give you a hint of what this is about, it's a mix between ideas from a book called Flatland, a colourful PSP game called LocoRoco and some of the creatures I have created so far....

Will keep you all updated on the progress of this! Watch this space.

Loss, Isolation, Perversion, Hopelessness and Frustration

2007-04-04T15:39:00.000+08:00

In the light of current events... here's something more negative to darken up your day - a 5-panel abstract piece featuring 5 dark emotions.

Enjoy yourself figuring out which is which.

Evolution to the Zodiacs

2007-03-18T11:45:00.000+08:00

Time for a drastic change in frequency and style as we travel back to the past a bit more. This is a doodle I did a long long time ago on the back of a writing pad - you can still see the creased texture of the brown paper. I've just colourized it on Photoshop to add a bit of depth to the picture and you can still see the title that my friend helped to give to this drawing - "Evolution to the Zodiacs", in his own handwriting. A pretty optimistic title, considering that I envisioned a sad, mutated bird-like creature unable to fly, clutching a beautiful wilting lily in its beak.

Ok, maybe I admit the teenage years fuelled some kind of artistic angst.

Radioactive Angel

2007-03-15T00:33:00.000+08:00

Here's something I did pretty long ago in an anime-inspired style. I took part in this T-shirt design competition, and the theme was "Radioactive" so I decided to interpret this theme in a slightly unconventional manner - designing an Angel of Radioactivity, spewing unstable molecules with her staff and holding an orb canister of uranium or something. OK, looking back at this I find it a bit cutesy and Power-Puff girl-ish, but anyway here's what I did. Notice the bright C100% Y100% green colour - it's meant to be Radioactive!

Angular Rabbit

2007-03-06T21:16:00.000+08:00

Peering through orthogonal hedge,

Is an Angular Rabbit with an edge.

With parallel lines as a pair of eyes,

A pointed tail of particular size.

Right-angle carrots are his food of choice,

And tangential lettuce makes It rejoice.

When the Angular Rabbit needs the loo,

It most gleefully poops out cubic poo.

Surreal Whale

2007-03-06T21:02:00.000+08:00

Remember the jellyfish post? Another creature which I think is really beautiful is the whale. I once told a friend that one of the last things I would do before I die would be to actually see a blue whale live in the ocean - a majestic creature that's as big as a bus or a house, but floating so gracefully in the water, reminding me of a huge space shuttle performing its slow ballet in synchrony with the planets in outer space.

Spatial Calendar Revisited

2007-03-02T19:05:00.000+08:00

Hey all! Thanks for the great ideas and responses after seeing my Spatial Calendar idea. Will be trying to develop the idea (once I'm free...haha) and here are some of the comments/suggestions that some of you have come up with:

1. Why is Saturday and Sunday the same size and rectangular?
>> Good question. Maybe this calendar seems more suited for the workaholic...

2. Maybe the boxes could be more free-form, and defined by the owner of the calendar.
>> That's a great idea. Was thinking of creating a random grid in the background which people can draw over to define the size of each of the days.

3. Maybe you could have date numbers floating around.
>> Possible. Then you could have little bubbles connected to these numbers, where you enter events and times. These bubbles could then be connected to each other as well!

4. Why the need for numbers / days?
>> You know...that's a very interesting question.. Why are we even numbering our days and dissecting our time like that? More of a philosophical question I guess... There's this idea of "free music" or music that breaks the boundaries of the space-time grid (regular beats in time), why not we break free of this cycle (day/night) and see our life more as EVENTS in a long long lifetime. Worth thinking about...

Bumping into a Little Creature

2007-02-23T00:19:00.000+08:00

Was experimenting with this style of illustration - it's pretty much the same way I did Nitro and the Dragon, but I wanted flat, bright colours that are somewhat like that of a children's story book. Here we see a lady purple dreadlocks/chicken/slug thing with her elephant/polar bear/skullface husband encountering a little seal along the way.

Some people ask me where on earth do I ideas for all these characters, and the truth is... I don't really know.

I played this game with a friend once where we drew random shapes on a piece of paper and had to fill in details so the shapes made sense ... or looked like something. I guess that's how these things are conceived - your pen just randomly moves around until u chance upon something that looks good to you, then you bring your idea to life.

Unfortunately, I realise that's how I design many other things as well - banking on pure chance and intuition, then riding the wave once you catch onto something. That's BAD when it comes to more function-driven design, for the record.

Spatial Calendar

2007-02-17T10:41:00.000+08:00

This is one idea of that I had that I was pretty interested in developing.

When you look at a calendar, you see equally spaced, boring blocks of empty space waiting to be filled in with activity. Because of the way you see these uniform blocks, it drives you to live your life in this routine way, forcing you to conform to a activity-time grid that determines your life.

What if you changed the way you looked at the days? Some days seems shorter, longer, more hopeful, exciting, constricting, inextricably linked with other events in time on other days. Here's a calendar that encourages the living of a non-conformist, non-routine life:

Seriously, don't ask me how it works. Just know that every week has 7 days.

Mutation's Abound

2007-02-17T10:25:00.000+08:00

Here's another plant from my series. It's inspired by the fusion of 3 things - a Zen Garden, a cactus and a faucet, thus I call this a "Faucet Cactus". I guess what these three things have in common is the idea of balance. The Zen Garden inspires balance, the existence of the cactus is a result of balance in a harsh climate, and the faucet is a tool to balance an equilibrium of flow.

(Man, this guy is really good at crapping the shit out of nothing.)

The result? Something that seems really at peace with itself and its flat stone base that it grows from. Enjoy.

Party Pills!

2007-02-16T22:27:00.000+08:00

When you feel like partying, you bring out the booze.
When you feel like partayyyyy-ing, you bring out the disco ball and a flashing dance floor.
When you REALLY feel like partayyyyyy-ing..... bring out the PARTY PILLS!

QB: Say YEAAHH!
People: YEAHHH!
QB: What you wanna do??
People: PARTYYY!
QB: What you wanna doooooo??
People: PARRRTTYYYY!!
Retarded Amoeba: Mambobobo-chi.
People: MAMBO!
Retarded Amoeba: Chachagoogoo..
People: CHACHA!

*Frenetic Latin music plays in the background*

Disclaimer:
Plastikk-cube is in no way endorsing the use of drugs in any form, and instead encourages the consumption of healthy alternatives like Tic-tacs.

Identity Crisis

2007-02-12T22:05:00.000+08:00

Liar Liar Great Balls of Fire

2007-02-08T12:22:00.000+08:00

Ok I lied about the last post being the ONLY panel. This is the 2nd scene where he reaches a tavern in the desert town. His spidery camel has 7(!!) legs. "All the better to walk with, my dear."

The Quest of Ears

2007-02-08T12:10:00.000+08:00

I have 2 really really bad tendencies which kind of screw up many many things in life.

1: I tend to have inertia in getting something started because I'm stuck or lazy. (like NOW)
2: I get something started really well, then I give up halfway or get lazy again.

This thing I'm showing here falls into the latter category. It's a vision that I had of starting a comic strip of a roguish guy with Big Ears who has some great task to do that ultimately causes accidental harm to people and creatures he comes across. Here is the very 1st panel and the only panel that I did after a gave up, realising the sheer amount of work that goes into this shit.

The setting is very fantasy-like, and the 1st scene would be a desert town run by red piggish things. Notice the details like the "egg-plant", the strange way of writing (in varying sizes of circles on a line) and stuff.

Things You'd Probably See After Sniffing Too Much UHU Glue

2007-02-06T19:51:00.000+08:00

Nitro is a fat dinosaur.
He loves bright colourful things like sunflowers and rockets, although everyone tells him sunflowers and rockets don't go together.
However, Nitro knows that on the Moon is a huge field with bright yellow sunflowers.
With his large red rocket strapped to his back, he hopes that someday someday, someone will light his bright red rocket so he blast off and fly to the Great Sunflower Field on the Moon.

The Dragon has had small wings for as long as he remembers.
He doesn't mind them, but sometimes they get caught in the leaves as he soars through the branches of trees in the rainforest that he lives in.
He sleeps a lot, mostly upside-down in a banyan tree.

Pokyu the Pufferfish

2007-02-06T19:31:00.000+08:00

As promised, here is Pokyu! Ernest approached me to co-design a package for a dehumidifying product that his aunt was promoting, some silica stuff. We came up with the idea of Japanese-looking packaging with a puffer fish mascot. You know, the fish soaks up water and puffs up...
Basically the idea was to make it as "Japanese" as possible, thus the jap words and the rectangle eyes for the cuddly fish. So here's the front of the packet:

Retarded Amoeba

2007-02-02T23:39:00.000+08:00

When in despair, ask the great Retarded Amoeba for valuable advice and It will bestow it upon you.

How to Get a Design Concept: The Secret Manual

2007-02-02T23:09:00.000+08:00

Ok this is something important for all archi people: the ultimate guide to getting an architectural concept for your design, compiled after my detailed analysis and understanding of NUS archi student's work. After reading this, you should have absolutely NO problem with a design concept!

Step One:
Whatever your program/art/school or whatever you're doing, even if it's a Dog Lover's Hostel or Ketupat-making school, just tell your tutor your design is about LAYERING. Then just link it to whatever you have.
e.g. Ketupats are woven with leaves creating LAYERS, so my concept is about layering.
e.g. Indian cuisine is about many smells and tastes, thus the idea of LAYERING.
e.g. When a dog craps on the ground, the poo, the grass, and soil form inextricable LAYERS.

Step Two:
Be sure to make it look CHEEM! Use common catchphrases that will leave the tutors nodding their heads in approval like:

1. This blurs the boundaries between the inside and the outside.
2. This takes the user on a journey through a series of orchestrated spaces.
3. This creates interesting nodes and spaces for people to gather.
4. This creates a sense of suspense as **** is suggested but not fully revealed.

Step Three:
Use cool tutor-approved words! Why say "put together" when you can sound pro with "juxtapose"? Why be stuck with the word "filter" when you can use a 3-syllabled word like "percolate"? The key to success is confusion.... don't forget!

Step Four:
When all else fails, use the Universally Approved Concept Statement that applies for every single damned design that you see:

"My design explores and challenges the relationship between Man, Nature, and the building by creating spaces that encourage activity and interaction among the users of the building. This is done by orchestrating a sequence of interesting spaces that slowly reveal themselves as the user moves through the building."

Be sure to add a series of diagrams that you directly scanned in from an obscure book, adding in lots of arrows and text that no-one would bother to read. To top it off, draw a HUGE pencil drawing (do spend more time on this) of your Ketupat or Dog, which would take up half of your concept panel.

Cool! Now you have a CONCEPT!

Bulbous Floater

2007-02-01T20:50:00.000+08:00

Q: What happens when you place an onion in a fish tank?

QB's Photoshop Clinic #1

2007-02-01T19:55:00.000+08:00

Thanks all for your kind comments on my art blog! To make it more worthwhile for you guys to visit, I've decided to start QB's Photoshop Clinic to reveal all the tricks and secrets of my very limited arsenal of Photoshop tricks. Haha!

Instantaneous Pop-Art Transformation (Difficulty Rating: 1 star)

1st up is a simple effect that demonstrates the use of 2 of my favourite filters in Photoshop: Cut-out and Find Edges. Application of these 2 filters would almost guarantee an artsy Andy Warhol-ish poster look that I really like and use a lot.

1st up: the original photo

This is a pretty cool photo I took of those advertisement boxes you find at bus stops - only that this one is broken and has a creeper growing within the glass... looking like some abstract advertisement for perfume or something.

Duplicate your photo layer.
Apply a FIND EDGES filter on your top layer and it should look like this after you DESATURATE the layer.

This process creates an outline effect that is very commonly used by Architecture students to fool tutors into thinking their photos are actually hand-drawn, in particular studies involving serial vision.

Apply a CUTOUT filter on your bottom layer and you should get this cool effect when you turn off the visibility of the top layer:

Turn on the visibility of the top layer then turn the blending mode to MULTIPLY and wow, you get this:

Ornate Maze Construction

2007-01-29T23:26:00.000+08:00

This one actually brings me back to one of my favourite pastimes long long ago - drawing mazes. Can you believe that I actually filled an entire piece of mahjong paper with a giant maze once... with passageways like 5mm wide. Took me damn long to do that... and I have no idea where it went.

Drawing mazes are somewhat therapeutic. You have to follow a strict set of rules in order to make a maze work, and to make it an enjoyable maze for someone to complete, you need a sense of anticipation of which path people are most likely to take. It's a craft that needs a lot of patience as well - a slip of the pen and you could close up the last path that leads to the end, making the maze unsolvable.

This is a simple maze inspired by a Chinese pattern I saw recently. I added some extra ornamentation just to make it look nicer, but most of the time my mazes would be purely circulation paths.

Drippy the Cloud

2007-01-27T23:19:00.000+08:00

I really really really hate having a running nose. Somehow the malfunctioning of such a small part of your body can cause a total shutdown of your entire physicality...
THIS is how I feel when I get a Drippy the Cloud:

Flight of Bubbles

2007-01-27T23:07:00.000+08:00

Another blast from the past. I did this way way back when I first learnt some techniques in Photoshop, and started playing and digitally painting my pen drawings (also having WAYY to much time on my hands). This one is a water dragon clinging on to his massive mummy. I wanted to capture the feeling of immensity; this is also accompanied by a sense of inevitable coldness and vulnerability. I guess sometimes that's how I feel in life - inextricably attached to something much bigger than myself, but still feeling hopelessly suspended and lost. Woooo.

16 Objects

2007-01-19T21:02:00.000+08:00

Objects. Every single object breathes with a life of its own, and tells its own story. Whether metallic and cut with machines, soft and spongy, randomly crystallized, transparent, tangled and grown over a long time, or crumpled and dry, objects together generate meaning. I did this little piece as a matrix of 16 fictitious objects with unclear origin or function.

2007-01-16T22:06:00.000+08:00

Here's something I did some time ago - it started off as a bunch (or bouquet) of arrows of differing transparency, and then I decided to turn it into a little jellyfish mascot of mine. I love jellyfish! The way they're freakishly alien yet so gracefully drifting and pulsating in the dark water...

Why the little plastikk qube

2007-01-16T21:32:00.000+08:00

To begin it all, I'd like to say that if I were to be an object, I'd most likely choose to be a transparent cube made of cheap plastic. Not acrylic, but the type of plastic that you make those capsules with little toys inside that come out of machines when you put a dollar in. The cube that is me would be about 5cm by 5cm by 5cm, just nice to hold in your palm. The plastic would be around 5mm thick, with no visible seams. And completely empty. I'd like to think of the centre as a complete vacuum, but I guess it would probably have trace amounts of air in it.

Of course, being a cube, this object would probably stack very efficiently, along with many other cubes of the same type and size, all transparent, like perfectly shaped ice cubes sitting within an invisible 3-dimensional grid made visible by the distortion of light. Some of these other cubes would contain gases of varying properties - light helium, flammable hydrogen - some pungent, some corrosive, some inert. All of which are completely transparent and invisible.