Fourth Septennial

Alright, it's my birthday today. An evaluation is called for. What have I done with my life so far? Where am I going? What have I learned and what else do I need to learn? What have I accomplished and what else did I set out to accomplish? While I'm quite happy where I'm heading, it wouldn't hurt to recalibrate. Let's start at the beginning and work our way to now, shall we?

Influences
Ever since I can remember, creativity and story have been part of my everyday life. I grew up in a house full of kids my age, rooms, books, toys, and newsprint. Even when I was a baby, I was part of a trio (me and my two cousins). Then a different trio later on (me and my two sisters), then the leader of a group of five even later on. And we were always doing little projects, playing make believe, and basically causing mischief wherever we went (which required a considerable amount of creativity).

Rooms. Growing up, we had two rooms upstairs that were solely for our playing. Whenever we wanted to play Princess-Princess, we went to the Blue Room, where all of my aunts' gowns were stored. When we wanted to play dolls, we went to the Aqua Room, where all of my older cousins' toys that were handed down to us were kept. Growing up, my sisters and I didn't have the newest toys, but we certainly had the most toys compared to my other cousins. All the hand-me-downs went to us. And with so much Barbies, My Little Ponies, G. I. Joes, She-ras, Popples, and a bunch of other toys, we had a full-fledged soap opera going for our dolls, complete with children, grand-parents, villains, and a thirty-horse ranch! And yes, we continued the story each time we played.

If we weren't upstairs, we would be in the carport exterminating termites with water guns, or doing archery like Robin Hood (using plastic straws for arrows), or drawing (like I said, we had newsprint lying around), or reading (or pretending to. We actually just memorize what's supposed to be written on that page). My Mom bought a lot of books. We had books by Dr. Seuss as well as books about Picasso. Actually, the Art books were Mom's, but she allowed us to read them as long as we didn't write on them. But she allowed us to write on our books. Our favorite book, a Children's Treasury of Knowledge book on Animals, was full of scribbles. It got destroyed because of too much handling so, Mom had to buy us another copy. Another set of books we had growing up was a collection of books about ancient civilizations. So, at an early age, we knew about Ancient Egypt (another favorite book. We didn't write on this one), Ancient Greece, and the Renaissance. And we used them in the stories we play out.

My First Books
Of course, as children, we emulate. So, since I read books, I also tried writing them. I made my first book when I was seven, I think. And I wrote it on bond paper, not newsprint! I cut the paper in four and scotch-taped the middle. Then I wrote my story on it, and I even illustrated it! My first book was entitled, "The Living Skeleton." It was about a scientist who spilled some experimental substance on himself, turning him into a living skeleton. In the end, he became a stage performer in a tux and a top hat (hey, I was seven). My next two books, done in the same fashion, were entitled, "The Princess Witch" and "The Crying Statue." Equally corny, but I love them anyway. I still have these two books with me. Unfortunately, I lost "The Living Skeleton." :(

My First Comic
In elementary, I was into comics and animation. My Dad was a big Daredevil fan so, we had those at home. I'm more Spiderman and X-men. And I liked the cartoons more than the comic. For one, the animation came every week.

I wanted to make stories for Animation. I wanted to write the story and have someone make the cartoon for me. Unfortunately, that was a little difficult back then, back there (and probably even here and now) so, I had to illustrate my story myself. Since I couldn't do animation yet during that time, I settled for the next best thing: Comics.

My first comic was entitled "Metaforce." It was a superhero comic with strong Marvel influences. It was fun making costumes and powers. But nobody was there to publish it. (And my art was not that good yet)

Just in case you were curious as to what stories I had for animation, one of them was entitled "Siopao Man."

My First Novel
When I was in second year high school, my whole family moved to Manila. New school, new language (before that time, I couldn't quite tell if what I was saying was Tagalog or Visaya), new friends, new influences. These were my Sailor Moon years.

I wrote a novel while I was in second year. I wrote it in Filipino. It was two notebooks long. The title was "GemForce" and it had strong anime influences. There are things about the story that still needs a lot of work, but it has good ideas so, it's currently a work in progress (as most stories of mine right now are). I've shelved it for now, but once I figure out what to do about certain parts of GemForce, I'll continue it. But with a different title.

Wanderings and Frustrations
It was in second year that I met my comics group. We tried getting into comics. But we were either not good enough, or we couldn't finish anything! Or we didn't have any money to publish our stories. Anyway, we didn't produce anything. It was very frustrating. We still tried. We're still trying.

My next story after GemForce was "Spirits." This one I made into a comic. By this time, my art had taken a turn towards anime. Though, I drew Spirits with cross-hatching of some sort. But since I couldn't get it published, I got frustrated and stopped drawing it on the third issue. I tried starting different comic stories, but I never finished anything. My stories had grown to epic lengths. My patience couldn't match them. The longest comic I was able to do was "Midnight Rose" with four issues. But that, too, is unfinished.

I'm still wandering. I went through third and fourth year starting stories I didn't finish. At the moment, I have almost 500 pages of unfinished comics. This is a big problem for me.

Subject Battle
What I wanted to study in college was Computer Animation. But during my time, no school in the Philippines offered that. So, I told my parents I wanted to study in Japan. But my parents told me to finish a four-year course here first. Then I could go look for a scholarchip to study what I want in Japan. Well then, my choices here were either computer or art. I opted for the former. I took up Computer Science at De La Salle University. There was hardly any art at all! Don't think shifting didn't cross my mind. It did. Everyday. You can't help it when it's the Mass Com media lab that you keep passing on the way to your building. Only sheer determination and my parents' disapproval from shifting (though, I never told them about wanting to shift) that kept me in ComSci. But I still had an outlet. I still made comics, and this time, my college published it. It was called "Subject Battle." I personified our Computer Science subjects and pitted them against one another. Isn't that fun? The only problem is, only the ComSci students of La Salle can understand what was going on. Still it was published in the college newsletter. It's still cool.

Target
Japan, finally! As planned, I finished ComSci and got a scholarship to study animation. Well, I studied Computer Graphics for Games. It's good, but I was very homesick. This made me irritable. Still, I was there. I had access to things I formerly didn't. But my problem since second year high school was still there! I continued to start stories but I didn't finish them! Well, I finished one comic, "Target." It was a short story, 12 pages long. It's not published, but hey, at least I finished a complete comic. That's an accomplishment for me.

Monarchs
After my studies, I returned to Manila. I relaxed a bit for a while. When I was in Japan, I read novels a lot. But Fantasy, mostly. I got interested in Romance after I got back. I wrote short stories in Japan and after I got back. One of my favorite is "Monarchs." It's a romantic fantasy.

Circus Freak
While still relaxing, my sisters and I joined an online animation contest called Animadness. We did a very short animation called "Circus Freak." It looked alright. We didn't win, though. :) But at least I was able to make an animation outside school. Up to that point, I only had my school projects to show for my animation portfolio. Wait, that's not true. I made "Catty Wampus" for fun, too.

Talecraft
My plan was to promote comics as an advertising medium. Thus Komikasi Enterprise was born (Komik Kasi). But before I could do any comics, I was struck by a sudden game idea: "Talecraft." Like a person possessed, I finished making all 86 cards in two weeks. And guess what, the game worked. People loved it. People use it! :D

MarsMag
But after I made Talecraft, I sort of slacked off. Two years after I created the game, I knew I needed something new. My comic group/high school friends and I thought about reviving our plan to make comics. We were so excited about it. My story was entitled "MarsMag." We made our teasers and distributed them at the Komikon last year. But then we didn't get as much readers as we wanted. Here's to another frustration. We had to discontinue the project. Sigh. Too bad. I liked MarsMag.

Now what?...
Actually, Talecraft is coming up with something for Toycon this year. No, not a new booster. It's something for character building this time. I think you'll like it. :)

Alright, let's evaluate. Ever since I was young, I've always wanted to make animation, to draw comics, and to write books. Okay, let's analyze each item.

Animation - All I have to show for this is Circus Freak, which didn't win, and Catty Wampus, which isn't really shown anywhere. I also have a 3D short entitled "Robby's Book," which I made when I was studying CG. But looking at it now, it can use a bit of work. I think my animation's pretty good, though. Not yet great, but pretty good, I think.
SKILL: pretty good
ACCOMPLISHMENTS: hardly any

Comics - Compared to animation, I've done more with comics. But my main problem is getting readers. It's not like my stories are bad. Most people haven't read them. But it's difficult to get people here to even try reading the comics of newbies.
ACCOMPLISHMENTS: 400+ pages worth of various unfinished comics, Subject Battle, Target

Book - Same problem with my uber long comics. I have no patience to finish. I have several unfinished novels in my computer. What I have done are short stories. But books have more weight.
ACCOMPLISHMENTS: The Living Skeleton, Monarchs


As for the course of action... Let me sleep on it for now. Maybe I'll post my action plan in another entry. :)