Tensai Tokyo Sketch Thread - Sept 28 Exhibition + Commissioned Work Tests!

[tensai]

Julien - i think one of the greatest influences from when i was a kid, 8 years old, was blueberry. i didnt know the moebius work then, but the work is obviously amazing. the influences dont have to show directly though. frank miller is another one, when the first dark knight came out when i was 15 or 16 or something it freaked me out, and it still does (hate the movie by the way). some other, bigger influences probably are syd mead, rembrandt's pen and brush ink drawings and etchings, japanese woodblock print artists, constant, sienkiewicz, chinese propaganda posters and some anime artists, although not many. im not that big on manga and anime, but what i like, i love. ootomo and cannabis and morimoto koji are all gods if you ask me. there are some architects and designers that have inspired me (although not many) and herbie hancock and miles davis have definitely had a big influence on me. i dont think these influences necessarily show in the work though, and i dont go and look at it when im doing a project or something. perhaps inspiration is a better word, and one of the biggest inspirations of all is the city. i love neon, i can drink it all day if i have to. ive had a number of people from europe talk about bilal when they saw some of my stuff. i like it, but havent seen a great deal of his work. which matsumoto do you mean? you sure made me curious... i'll stop now, cause it starts to look really pretentious.

pennington - yeah, its marker or sharpie with posca markers, which is filled with gouache or something similar (its water based paint and its opaque, so that comes pretty close)... theyre fun, try it out.

purb36 - funny, thats what my wife said about nikuman. she wants me to put it on my site. hope i can do a little more work on that back - alley soon, its taking way too long to finish.

bee-dubya - thanks man. i did have a good one. i might show some stuff later of where i went for my b-day; a tunnel system under tokyo.

Zord - thanks man. you seriously got me all excited talking about oozing mixtures and pulsating cities. im glad it has that effect on some people. i love it when i get high off of somebodies work, illustrations, movies, paintings or music. i have done some pan and zooms with the backgrounds and it does work quite well. ive done many sessions with friends for some animations but it always dies out.
i recently met this crazy genius animator (that unfortunately doesnt have a site) who i would love to collaborate with. im sure it will eventually come of it. although i doubt its sometime soon... and in the mean time i have a shit load of stuff to learn aout drawing. thanks for dropping that comment though man.

small update with more crap thumbnails -










of these i like the last one.


oh, check this guys blog. its a really really nice mixture of anything that has to do with drawing, sketching, painting, comics, cartoons, webcomics, illustration, digital art, concept art, gallery art, artist tools and techniques, motion graphics, animation, sci-fi and fantasy illustration, paleo art, storyboards, matte painting, 3d graphics and anything else he finds visually interesting. If it has lines and/or colors, it's fair game.

http://www.linesandcolors.com/

i just came across it recently, and check out what he put on there recently

comments and crits as always appreciated.

[[void]]

Great stuff, love the style. Those thumbs have got a really dynamic quality to them, they all look like they are spreading out in a really organic way. Wow im getting all pretentious.

Anway cool shit, keep updating!

[guggemmaneuver]

very sophisticated and nice color harmony tensai,
and thanks for that link to lines and colors.
fun fun
j

[P E N Ricklund]

Nice looking. You've got some clean lines there.
And thumbs for world domination

Hugs!

[Idiot Apathy]

Hehe, very cool to just out of the blue see you on Linesandcolors, amazing contribution by the way.
Edit: No way! I was talking about your contribution, you sick sonuvabeech you're on there today Congrats!

Anyways, cool to see you still kicking ass and doing your thing, cheers.

[pennington]

Hehe, very cool to just out of the blue see you on Linesandcolors, amazing contribution by the way.
Edit: No way! I was talking about your contribution, you sick sonuvabeech you're on there today Congrats!

Anyways, cool to see you still kicking ass and doing your thing, cheers.

yeah ditto!

[tensai]

Asgardian - thanks man, will definitely do.

gugg - was trying something new with that one. always good to hear some other opnions - i thought it might be a bit watery.

pencilator - hugs? i want kisses and spanking! but i guess this will do...

Idiot Apathy - hehee. yeah i was happily surprised as well. its a great blog and i think charley is a really good writer too. there are a lot of sites and magazines about graphics or illustration that are really lacking in content i think. its refreshing to see a guy making interesting connections and putting things into a greater context.

your killing me with your recent updates by the way. seriously man.

pennington - thanks man.

for updates -
some peeps from ref.




the guy on the right looks sort of like a salaryman doing a semi erotic pose. dont know. i like the guy on the left in this one.

and this is where i went for my b-day. an underground tunnel system theyre diggin under tokyo. i have a lot more photos of course, but im still processing.







comments and crits as always appreciated.

[Ham-e]

Hi tensai, Great SB!! you make me want to visit Tokyo. I love that shoe you designed. All your work is very fresh just love it. See Ya

[tensai]

Ham-e - you should come over. its especially great to visit. we should have a workshop here! thanks for dropping by man.

these are some photos from the drillhead. the drill head pushes back against the prefab panels it already put up (the hydrolics you see there). it makes a rotation once every two minutes or so. the forward speed is an amazing 30mm/min - or 1.8m per hour. check it.









last photo shows the arms just behind the rotating part of the head putting up the panels for the sides of the tunnel.

[Alday.J]

Julien - [...] i'll stop now, cause it starts to look really pretentious.

No, no ! It's not pretentious at all ! It was a very interesting reply, thanks for take the time. I think there's a lot a variety in your influences, wich is good and I understand [and approve !] when you said that influences are not supposed to be that obvious in the work. That's why I have asked you ! I was thinking about Taiyo Matsumoto, for his very energic and loose drawings [another guy "influenced" by Mœbius]. It's true there's a lot of talented Matsumoto, lol ! Aside that: Nice bunch of updates, the photographies are really impressive !!! Wow ! It's like science-fiction for me !
Sayonara, Aniki !
J.

[Shinryu]

nice updates tensai, great photos aswell, would be great to visit japan sometime

keep it up

cheers mate

[Ham-e]

man thats cool! we need one of those in Toronto, they take forever to make new subway tunnels here. That drill speed is amazing! Nice photos btw

[madplanet]

Great photos, I can almost "see' your line flowing through them, lol. These have to be some great reference photos for you; did you happen to bring a sketchbook with you?

[tensai]

julien - oh that matsumoto! its stupid cause i have some artbooks from him right next to me. i do like what that guy is producing. but he is not so good that it hurts, you know what i mean?

shinryu - you definitely should. it's actually not that expensive anymore. dinner and stuff like that are comparable to prices in amsterdam, cheaper than london, NY right now. i know some great pleaces to draw too!

Ham-e - the funny thing was they actually did a u-turn with that thing. and drilled all the way back. it weighs 2000 or 3000 metric tons and they turned it on ball bearings the size of tennis balls.

madplanet - wow spot on! i always want to draw when im taking these photos. but we had very very little time and were with a group of people and workers. even now they were always waiting for me cause i still 'had' to take another photo. my friends were great though, they kept on stalling with more questions etc.

ok, small update on this alley portrait. worked a bit on the values, but keeping it rough. i think i want to keep the palette semi-monochrome so i dont know if im gonna keep the neon in it. the colours on the web version are very very different though. way more watery. i think i ll have to add some hot pinks in there or something if i want to go with the neon.



comments and crits as always appreciated.

[Nils_Carstens]

i always enjoy lookin through ur line work. it's great stuff. So far i liked either the pieces with line work only or those where u introduced greys and one high key color the most.
the bag is killer aswell ^^.

I'd love to see how a line art version of those photos would look.

take care
dreckster~

[Ham-e]

woa! thats a nice peace man, good work. imo the neon is good so if you feel the need to add the pink you should go for it! I would try to push the contrast just a bit more. How big is this bad boy? I think you added the face in PS>Can you tell me how you twisted it? Can't wait to see more

[oishiiniku]

Great updates, Tensai! You're really developing your own style here. Is that underground tunnel system where they'll be storing Akira? Those photos are pure science fiction goodness!

Ta, Nick.

[tensai]

Dreckster - thanks for the comments man. you know i love your book.

Ham-e - yeah its annoying cause the colours always look quite different when viewed from outside of photoshop. its also definitely more contrasty than this. when i have a final piece i often make a version adjusted for the web etc, but since this is a wip i dont do that all the time. whatever.
i often put billboards of sketches of peeps i did earlier in these cityscapes. so you're right. i dont remember what i did exactly but its always just a matter of working with the trnasform tool. skew and perspective mostly. (cmd T your layer and right clik for a list of options).

oishiiniku - its funny that you say that cause the first time i went underground and up to the drill head i felt exactly like i was inside the complex where they kept akira. it was also like a constant earthquake cause the drill was working its way through the ground etc. and with all the pipes and boosts of air (oxygen) being pumped in etc, pipes running everywhere. the photos really don't do it justice.
glad you like the 'style'. always dangerous to pin yourself down however. but i do love the experiments and how my linework is developing. even if the drawings are not amazing or anything.

as for updates -
some quick sketches from ref i shot in the train -





from an old slide i took when i was in the mountains in china in 1996








i did all these thumbnails searching for shapes, using parts of an airplane side view. i cut it up different parts and put it together and kept on doing that for an hour or something till i had around 30 of them.




its for an introduction 'art/design' course i have to teach to second year architecture students here in tokyo. since they dont have a lot of technique yet, which will be part of other courses the students get, im focussing on learning to see, and methods for playing (idea generation, suspension of critique, cross-pollination etc.)

starts next week. i thing it will be a lot of fun.

comments and crits as always appreciated.

[Ham-e]

Hi tensai, nice update...I really like that first portrait you realy capture something about him or a projection of what you think of him. Thats a cool technique with the airplane parts...it will be fun to unleash it on your students and see what they come up with, I'm sure they will blow your mind. Thanks for the tip I've never used the transform>perspective tool before but now it will come in handy...I would have made the process much more complicated. Thanks see ya

[John T]

Great new stuff. Cool faces, and I really like this pic, excellent work. I think I personally prefer it without the neon, but that's just me.

My Sketchbook

[SirGreenSock]

Great book! Youve really established an amazing style for yourself!

No crits as of yet, gonna keep an eye out though!

[Shylone_Breath]

hey Tensai ,
i must say you that i ve never saw one of your sketche , only on your website . Your line is very efficient , i like that, you are a good inspiration to seek new shape for architecture work. by the way, i thank you for your tips. I hope we can see your tunnel finished soon.
cheers.

[bwkeough]

those studies you did with the airplane diagrams are really interesting. and it sounds like a very cool class you'll be teaching. if you happen to have some lecture notes in English, I'd definitely like to see them!

[kevin121685]

i love how you put color in all the right places... my eyes really get caught up with that beautiful line work... absolutely beautiful!

[tensai]

Ham-e - thanks for the comments man. the im trying to get the faces warped, or how i see them, but at the same time i want to add some solidity/3d form behind them. dont hesitate to ask any PS questions. i lllove short cuts and dont mind sharing...

John T - thanks for dropping by man. i think i agree with you on keeping the neons out. this drawing doesnt really need it. there is always this urg to take something further and further, totally destroying what you built up and starting new, just to convince myself that i cant squeeze out something more. but sometimes its just enough, and better to start on something else. this might be one of them.

SirGreenSock - thanks, im trying out a lot of things that to me at least are totally different. im not looking for a style, and dont want to be limited by one. i do see what you mean though. hit me with crits any time you spot something man.

Shylone Breath - how are you doing man? im glad some of this seems inspiring. would love to see some architectural sketches in your book man.

bee-dubya - i think i can put some stuff up later on. im still changing it all the time but i gave the first class last week and it went really well. we did some basic ideation practice by filling in circles with different ideas in them/around them, and we did the airplane part sketching. during these excersises i put everybody under time pressure and i thought they would be put off, but people were mad excited. it was a lot of fun to compare everybodies ideas and there was so much variety, some students really surpised me. really cool. i hope the rest of the course is going to go as well as the first week...

if i forget, do remind me though.

kevin121685 - thank you. i feel i have very little idea about colour yet, so im still trying to learn from a lot of people around here. thanks for droppig in man.

quick pen, gouache sketch of john berkey


some of the thumbnails using the method above but then just using pen and paper.














little 'bot on mylar with copics and pencil


and one in my sketchbook.

[stine]

ugh, awesome! love the accuracy in your drawings and the sense of form you achieve when coloring them. i'm also really envious of your penmanship. *leaves and practices lines and circles again*. thanks for sharing! cheers,

stine

[3nasty]

nice sketches, man*,inspiring ...

[Ham-e]

Hey tensai, solid update love the form your getting with that technique I can see your still chopping up airplanes I like the two color images that resulted. That's a nice offer to share your PS knowledge, thanks I'll be sure to ask you for help but I'm on pc and I think your on mac. Anyway keep up the good work

[Mike Frank]

Hey dude got some really cool work in here. I especially dig that alleyway scene!

[tensai]

ill answer/update later. just putting this up.
china marker -


and this one - cause i just sold it to be used on a book cover here in japan.


comment and crits as always appreciated,