Tensai Cityscapes - Ink Figure Series!!! - pg6; 10 Aug

**quietadrian** · October 24th, 2005, 01:18 AM

Geez, impressive stuff here man. You have a ridiculous attention to detail! I'll be checking back here for updates.

**flaptraps** · October 24th, 2005, 03:31 AM

man tensai your crazy! in a good way, the detail and patience you have is awesome. the light blue urban looking pieces are my fave, the upside down city stuff. it's fun to look at the crazy space you create. belongs on a t shirt or snowboard or something! cool stuff.

**liquidwerx** · October 25th, 2005, 07:59 PM

Nicely done!

M

**CamStatic** · November 3rd, 2005, 04:18 AM

Oh my.. all the details... o.o
Totally awesome!
I love that last drawing, nice colors. ^^

**paarma** · November 9th, 2005, 05:56 AM

damn!
I've never see anything like this..

**Cique** · November 9th, 2005, 07:19 AM

OMG, there brilliant

**tensai** · November 10th, 2005, 03:55 AM

thanks everybody for the comments.

quietadrian - i wanted to comment with an update, but starting my sketchbook here and doing other stuff is taking its time. keep that Watts thing going and Update man!

flaptraps - yeah based on that upside down city (NewWorldWonder its called) i was asked to do t-shirt design for a national chain store here. made all these designs and in the end they chose to just use a hand written scribble, cause they liked my handwriting so much..(??)

liquidwerx - thanks - you got some real nice figures going on yourself.

CamStatic - glad you like the last one too. bit of a different approach. im still not sure if im gonna redo some stuff on that one.

paarma - left a message in you book. like the linequality. you got to put more stuff up man.

Cique - thanks mang.

check out the sketches for some totally different stuff.

**Dirty C** · January 23rd, 2006, 08:37 PM

God, I'm blown away by all of this. It's almost impossible to add anything, really. I love that your work shows your surroundings so strongly. Your mind seems to be so borne of Tokyo and the crazy magnificence of the place. Most people would find that much detail simply crushing - both in their eyes and in their work.

Phenomenal, dude.

**michael see** · January 23rd, 2006, 09:09 PM

fantastic details with simple colors!awesome

frog and *BAM* · January 23rd, 2006, 09:31 PM

These are truly breathtaking. Remind me ALOT of Aeon Flux, very very very cool. Truly inspirational too.

**Silveraxe** · January 23rd, 2006, 10:46 PM

All the cityscapes are breath-taking! All those small details are crazy -in a good way!
Yesterday I just started doing some cityscapes myself, and now seeing your work just influenced me even more! :D

This one is my favorite amongst them all: link
keep it up!

**tensai** · January 24th, 2006, 06:36 AM

huh, where did this suddenly come from? stars! sankyu sankyu.

- dirty_c: thanks man. coming from you that is making me speechless. seriously. i think its just that im obsessed with the scale and complexity of this place. things are so unpredictable that the city and its systems seems almost organic. fly-overs, aircons, ducts, wires - theyre so wild its almost like greenery. nobody seems to be in control of it and it just keeps on growing... and i love neon. i want to design some...

- michael see: thanks, im really impressed by stuff from the old woodblock masters and how they got such lively images with so little means. if i could create something with a sliver of the same power, i would be one happy dude.

- frog and *BAM*: i had to look up what Aeon Flux was, but thanks

. im glad its inspiring.

- Silveraxe: cheers man. i always like to hear which pieces people like. im curious what you will make of your cityscape.

since there is no art on page two, i think i better put up some new art in here.. not as good as the other stuff, and already posted in my sketchbook, but nonetheless:

edit - in text image link replaced with attachment at the bottom

this was originally about trying to get an atmospheric effect like fog down with minimal effects. but i often like to change a picture in the end and in this case i thought i would drop some sort of colour bomb in there...

im doing a cityscape for a new chinese magazine right now, its a WIP in my sketchbook, but when its finished ill post it in here.

thanks and again,
comments and crits greatly appreciated...

**Silveraxe** · January 25th, 2006, 02:59 AM

I scanned my citysketches

here's the link

**dire-musaera** · January 25th, 2006, 05:08 AM

scarily good... the attention to detail is boggling.

**ruzkin** · January 25th, 2006, 05:09 AM

I'd like to leave some meaningful comment here, something that picks out flaws or areas to improve - but I can't. This is all so fantastic, full of energy and detail... it borders on the obsessive, but what the heck. I love it.

**AgAtA** · January 25th, 2006, 01:35 PM

Your work is mesmerising !

All-interesting...

**Jaunty** · January 25th, 2006, 09:56 PM

Seriously, I've got to know, how long does it take you to crank one of these cities out? They're amazing

**timpaatkins** · January 27th, 2006, 09:46 AM

Hey Tensai, wow amazing detail, love the way you maintain lineweight throughout! Also how everythings seems freehand, yet very solid. Hard Boiled comes to mind! How long did you spend on the most complicated one? (your choice)

Cheers TIm

**Dirty C** · January 27th, 2006, 04:05 PM

Hard Boiled.. can't believe I didn't remember it...

**Pootle** · January 27th, 2006, 04:25 PM

Wow, amazing cityscapes.

I love the pink one. I really get the feeling of connection with the place - what it feels like to be there - priceless!

Some rambling observations on the N.Korean hotel: first whoa, there is so much symbolic stuff in there. I thought the hotel worked well as a fulrum within the image/symbolically. The balance of the piece seems to be in the past, reflecting a view on the current regime(?) [QUOTE just to be super clear - we made this propaganda image for our idea of reform and to advertize the idea that this kind reform, altough not ideal, at least seems to be a better direction than continue the destructive course this dictatorship is on now.]
I think your concept for the reuse of the hotel is great, it (like the image) works on lots of different levels, for me notably social/humanist, environmental with and eye on a commercial agenda.
I hope this is not too political but it is what the piece communicates to me. :-0

How did the comp go? I'd be interested to see more of your submission.

**tensai** · February 21st, 2006, 03:18 AM

its been way too long since the last update, ive been bussy doing some other stuff.

Silveraxe, dire-musaer, ruzkin, AgAtA - thanks for the props, i greatly appreciate it.

Jaunty, timpaatkins - these take quite long of course. line work can last for a couple of days (i cant do them all day long cause i got some problems with my wrists and elbows - i wonder why...). colouring same story, but it also depends on if im happy with it. i often change things quite radically in the end.

dirty_c - Hard Boiled, cant believe i dont know it... will check it out. keep up the good work man.

Pootle - thanks for the comments, especially on the north korean hotel competition. the way you read it is basically the way we wanted it to be read. we did quite some research, technically and historically and used that to try and design something that would come from that and provide something usefull on multiple levels. its not clear yet whats going to happen. a couple of exceptional entries is gonna get published in the magazine, but when and which is still unknown.

aight - as for the finished piece, those that visited my sketchbook know this one was a bit of a struggle.
its an illustration for a chinese magazine that is not out yet. the first issue is about lifestyle and i wanted to do a local cityscape with a biggass baby siting in the middle of it. the babies toys are all these highly coveted gadgets that are the same size as the buildings. im doing this cause i sort of want to comment on the post-modern chinese boom architecture that all looks like toys with pink and jade tiles combined with mirrors and polished chrome for columns etc. the toys and architectures lifespan is both really short.
i wanted to have a red commy glow looming in the background, leaving it up for the viewer if it represents dusk or dawn.

comments and crits greatly appreciated

**tensai** · February 21st, 2006, 04:00 AM

oops small mistake

**michel** · February 21st, 2006, 05:09 AM

what the…damn…you gave cityscapes a try!!!
these are awesome! they look sketchy but you put real depth and atmosphere in these pieces. i love it.
(but by the way…when was the last time you've seen daylight or breathing fresh air, huh?

)

michel

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**Dirty C** · February 21st, 2006, 01:24 PM

wicked, dude. you even made me go do it in london hehe - though on about a 1/20th scale - I'll maybe try a bigger one sometime soon. Great stuff as usual.

**feeesh** · February 23rd, 2006, 12:01 PM

Hey Tensai!! APologies for not getting back over to your sketchbook sooner after ou'd asked me to swing by and take a look at some of your new cityscapes. Perfect timing though as you just posted htis new one. I think it was very well executed actually. I totally "got it" pretty much before i even read your comments about what it's meaning was supposed to be.

As for technical stuff, I think you color choices were great. The reddish orange and grey was over it give it a nice dusk feel which makes all the toys and logos and such pop out or draw your eye to them without being obnoxiously bright.

As for the city art itself, well hey, what can I say, brilliant as always man. SO much great detail without looking like a big jumbled mess.

Also I saw over on your Tokyo Sketchbook the rooftop one-liners you did. Those are totally cool man. Such a simple thing but I really liked it.

feeeeeeeeesh

**Sirio_Brozzi** · February 23rd, 2006, 01:46 PM

Your last cityscape kicks ass and takes names.

Such unusual decisions on what you placed in there(whats the theme youre going for?), but heck, its great fun to look at dude. Just like Feesh said, so much detail without a jumbled mess.

**koshime** · March 13th, 2006, 11:02 AM

Awesome Cityscape Tensai - got to hand it to ya you have infinite patience of a sword saint....i particularly like the way your artwork is stylised almost iconographic if you could lend that term to enviroment/architectural art.

I have always imagined doing a grand scale architectural layout of variosu cities of non existant places but have never had the courage to do so. Now that i see how you approach it, it is making burn with fire/passion to try something similar

**DerMidlet** · March 14th, 2006, 02:44 AM

Those cityscapes are crazy man, and I really like the propaganda collage. Keep it up

**gnie** · March 14th, 2006, 10:03 PM

good work, beautiful color

**masque** · March 17th, 2006, 09:26 PM

tensai, the unabashed density of your cityscapes is mind-boggling, just amazingly true to modern metopoli but at the same time wonderfully stylized. ballsy color use, too, neon on low-sat greys, you make them work so well in concert. on to your SB!