spicy99

art references/inspo pt 2

Busy month but I am successfully getting my Patreon posts in >:) this is to answer all the questions I get about who where what is going on in my collector lifestyle. Next post will be project breakdowns for today's drop~ 

first pic is my Tekkonkinkreet Jun Planning figures! This is one of my most grailed purchases and I've been wanting this since forever. The bodies are sculpted like figures however the clothes feel... like real doll clothes coated in a plastic layer? The jewel...

garage/resin kits tutorial

Lemme start off with saying that I gained the confidence to get into this hobby after watching Leona's Workshop videos. She is not only extremely experienced, she's also the kind of anime nerd that I still nurture within myself. I have mad respect for her and I'll really just be walking through my own experience with my first 2 resin kits here!

The first kit I attempted was this Tanamushi Mina from 2022-01-18 21:55:45 +0000 UTC View Post

garage kit pre-dump & art references

Next post will be covering my process on my first garage kit. This one is more background and sources for story posts etc.

First off, here’s a list of everything I hauled from 3 book-offs in California (Westminster, Costa Mesa, and Torrance). If you’re not familiar, they’re a Japanese franchise that sells second hand books, DVDs, manga, anime, electronics, etc. There is one in New York midtown. All the figures we...

I got covid

hey ya'll, if you saw on my story I've been fighting for my life this week. I had a ton of plans for happy99 but both Dom and I got sick causing our entire workforce of 2 to stop dead in the water. I've been working extra hard to get this drop in before the holidays because every year, we always drop way too late (like late January) so we've been hauling ass to make this year more on-time. 

I'm vertical finally, so I'm able to work a little. I may just try to make a really cool pro...

holy hell that's a lot of inspiration (pt 1)

this is about to be a lot because I've been insanely into so many things. I'll break this up into 2 posts. First, I'll start with some shows I'm completely smitten about (as in, I watched each episode as it aired or binged it if the whole season dropped). Next, I'll do toys and books and everything else.

1. Arcane. If you haven't gotten into it, it's incredible. I can't stop te...

house tour kinda

hey YALL, been taking apart my house and reassembling it to look more like I wanted it to look when I moved in here last year. They look nice but the bookshelves are just plain old billy bookcases from ikea. The TV and fancy USM table belong to a friend who parked his stuff in my house while he lives a nomadic lifestyle. I’ve decided to not blow up my house on public social media until I do a proper video but I’m now actually close to doing that (it looked really unassembled and pathetic ...

motion tracking 3 of ???

okay. so I knew I had recorded some progress work when I had first returned to NY for the next part of the motion tracking series... but I couldn't find the video anywhere. Instead I find this clip of me (dated July 14th 2021) after drinking sake alone at a bar rambling on about how I had lost the first version due to overloading my PC. This is believable. What's unbelievable is that I managed to create a pretty cohesive video about my (then) progress on the scene. 

I decided today...

Inspiration, motivation, etc

Seasonal depression kicked my ass a few weeks ago. I was in a super post-project slump after releasing the doll babies into the world and it felt like cloudy weather hit NYC really fast and really hard. It felt like summer switched off and fall came on instantaneously…

I’m back to being motivated which is why I appear before you. I wanted to talk about some things that keep me on my toes and keep me going. First off, some anime.

2021-10-12 16:36:36 +0000 UTC View Post

motion tracking 2 of ????

cool so this is 3 months late but better late than never!!!!

1st part: I use adobe premiere to key out the green screen of the same footage I motion tracked in the last video. I know it's possible in blender but I'm a bit more comfy w premiere.

2nd part: I set up the scene using the exported transparent PNG sequence and start building stuff around it. I also explain why my scene kinda sucks for this because she's laying down instead of standing up so learn from my mistakes!!<...

fall doll photoshoot 3/3

so I'm a crazy person and 2 dolls wasn't enough so I backtracked a little to make a 3rd doll and more doll heads + wigs to optimize more of a shoot

I nearly ripped my own hair out working with the curly brown hair wefts for the first time... I won't get too into it, but I had to cut SO MUCH HAIR to make it work. I definitely ragequit and went to bed on the verge of tears at 4AM one night because i thought there was no saving the wig. I also rage quit again when I had to hand sew a silve...

fall doll photoshoot 2/3

I went to midtown and swatched a ton of random fabrics and bought tiny elastics of gold, navy blue, silver, etc. We're lucky to be working with really tiny dolls so most of the swatches were more than enough for me to finesse into clothes. I did actually hem my own size small happy ringers to harvest the right green and gold fabric for the little guys (lmao dedication). Both shirts were entirely hand sewn (ouch) and we bought heat transfer sheets for both light and dark shirts to print out ou...

fall doll photoshoot 1/3

We ultimately decided to just make our own head and use a 24cm obitsu doll body as the base. I got these doll heads and 2021-09-20 16:04:24 +0000 UTC View Post

doll research!!

so if you've been around for a while, you'll know that dom and I are a HUGE fan of dolls. He's super into 1/6 scale which is like barbie, GI Joe, etc. I actually like 1/3 scale BJD (ball jointed dolls) like volks. We've been looking for excuses to create a doll photoshoot for some time now and we finally found a good enough reason to put together an editorial using 1/6 scale dolls. Of the 1/6 scale models, Dom is obsessed with momoko dolls. They're pricy because they're part of a massive comm...

low poly modeling tutorial~

sorry I've been so sick on and off... struggling with the psychological torture of intense seasonal allergies. I had been SEEMINGLY cured of this bi-annual hell for the last 3 allergy seasons making this return... extremely depressing. I'm back with this video that I sound extra nasally in.

this video features some characters I had made for the sonic video a few months back!

I'm rushing on a quickie comic project for a zine and a doll photoshoot project for a magazine ad but fun c...

character modeling walkthru

Can't believe I got another video finished before the month was up, I'm on a roll!!!

This one was a voice over which I admit, is a bit more challenging to edit but more rewarding because I can do things like add music and be less rambly. The video is also way shorter too!

This isn't quite low poly but more of a breakdown of how I go about it. I only just learned how to do this efficiently since moving to Blender from C4D but it is all the same conceptually. Just different buttons ...

parappa project technical breakdown

pls enjoy this 1 hour long neurotic post-project rant of how I built the parappa-style characters, set up the scenes, and any fun shortcuts i learned while working on this. 

the whole project started and ended in about 12 days. we took literally 0 days off, 9-12 hours a day on average, and yeah I appreciate ya'll giving me 2 days to collect myself but I do still sound very crazy (when do I not lol) but I'm really proud of how it came out. 

I'll be MIA for the next few da...

parappa project conceptual breakdown

okay so if you're seeing this, the video is out in the world!!!! and I am excited to say yes... it was Parappa inspired. There are other fun easter eggs in there too so I wanted to make this post about the design influences and then another post in the next few days about how tf I did it lmao

TURNS OUT making a paper flat 2D character move around in 3D space is actually difficult... 

1-2. All the junkyard/spinning piles of stuff were a nod to an anime dom and I watched last y...

motion tracking??? part 1 of...?

if you didn't see my previous patreon post, please give that a read because this builds off of it! This video is 1 of I believe 3-4 that I've filmed. It took many trials and errors before I got decent results so it took a minute to organize and push out into the world. 

but not much to say here, other than here is my favorite video I've ever made because I couldn't contain my excitement. It's more of a process than a tutorial because while I filmed, I was so sure I was not going to...

motion tracking (the set up)

so!!! this builds off the previous post I made before I left Westminster, but I went up to LA for 2 days and stayed with my friend Juliana @anominalia. After throwing a manic deck at my 3 girl friends overnight, we went in on a Friday night and fully finessed a green screen set-up and shoot with multiple looks. It was chaotic to say the least but I've got cute BTS to make up for it.

We did this all in Juliana's house and studio. I purchased a 10x20' green screen and had it expedited to ...

patreon on pause!

1. hey ya'll! I'm getting ready to head back to NY and that involves shipping my massive painting home and prep to ship out all the backed up gifts from the last few months (I know... my life is a train wreck)

I am feeling on top of the world as of late. I've warmed up to being alone (not codependent) through a book called Attached. It simplifies the spectrum of human interpersonal relationsh...

painting update and some tips!

1. First image was shot after the first 8 hours of pushing oil paint around. I've said this before but I highly prefer oil over acrylic because 1. acrylic is a different color when it is wet vs when it is dry and 2. acrylic dries super fast and requires you to mix large amounts of a color in containers to preserve the accuracy of the colors. 

Oil takes longer to dry meaning you can seriously wipe it off or mix on the canvas (you shouldn't because colors get muddy but it's nice to h...

new painting!!

so I usually sketch out what I want to do digitally so I can make all my mistakes in a low stakes environment.... but I tried so many types of compositions and ultimately scrapped them all because I was too in my head about making a “perfect” painting.

It’s hard to one-up yourself when the last thing you did feels like the best thing you’ve ever made and I rage quit and started drawing myself (lain style) exhausted and art blocked at my desk... which then ended up looking the be...

first time designing toys

Hi guys so my Netflix collaboration for EDEN and Yasuke are finally out meaning I am free to talk about it (at least I'm pretty sure this isn't doing anyone any intellectual harm lol)

I worked on this months ago on one of the tightest deadlines I had ever received. I had less than a week to draft up concept illustrations before the shows were even out. This meant that I had to work with a show I had not yet seen, giving me very little insight on what any of it was going to mean. I’m s...

prints

After a gruesome month of testing different sizes and colors... I’ve finally worked out a print sample that’s perfect. The costing is a bit steep but super worth it given the vibrancy of the colors! I’m now waiting for the full shipment of prints so I can send out to the patrons I owe from 2 months ago!

I’ve been a total recluse from the world and decided to challenge myself on how to code and.... it’s really hard. I’m working in three.js (JavaScript) to build a 3...

blender project walkthru

wow I'm on a roll guys, not only did I post 2x today I also filmed AND edited this right after... in the same day. CRAZY what happens when I am not juggling 8 deadlines... is this freedom??

anyway clearly exposed myself: I have not moved home yet. I was supposed to go Monday the 3rd but it's clearly now Monday the 10th but I have my ticket finally for WEDNESDAY in 2 days ajlskdfjkdlfjs it's very exciting... 

side note: after a dizzying 3 weeks of thinking "should I completely...

new non-work work, inspiring discoveries, & controversial topics

OK! So I've been meaning to talk a little about something I've been dying to try which is hugely in part of my 3D role model... Ian Hubert.

I mentioned him a little in the NYU panel talk and was super excited to see that others knew of this legend as well! He's known for these really short tutorials for Blender that he calls Lazy Tutorials. The guy is an eni...

NYU Panel Livestream (Patreon Version)

So as I mentioned before, no one was able to get the full 1 hour 20 minute livestream, so the best I was able to retrieve was about 1 hour (missing the juicy first 20 minutes of the panel). I did my best to reenact and re-record this portion to stitch a complete version together for my beloved patrons :)

Tysm for being patient while I juggled moving and wholesaling and 3 projects as usual.

NYU live stream!!

hey y’all as most of you know, I hosted my first ever live stream (it was a 3D webinar) for the cool folks over at NYU program board! I want to thank everyone who tuned in I had an amazing time and want to make live-streaming a part of my patreon schedule bc it was so fun!!!

I do want to mention that the plan was to record it but only the 2nd half was recorded..... so! I’m currently sourcing pieces and parts of it from random attendees... and I’ll re-enact whichever segment was l...

Inspo dump & life updates

I received this book from a friend maybe a year ago but recently went back to look through it but it’s so fire I just had to make a post about it.

B4 I get into these artists, I have a general announcement!! I’m moving back home (Westminster aka Garden Grove aka 30 miles south of LA) to detox from NY, get therapy, and be with my parents. I had a really big life change between March and April & I’ve been struggling to get out of my depressive state of mind. I decided to do this...

Thinking about colors (pt 2)

Following up the previous post. I decided to try painting with secondaries which is terrifying.

I think most of us learn red/yellow/blue first so when thrown into green/orange/purple we all have no idea what to do. I watched this one video by the amazing James Gurney. He’s a popular oil painter on youtube and in this particular video he only uses the 3 secondary colors.

This lead to my exploration of lavenders,...