Just wanted to draw a pretty girl.

Never need an excuse for that, now, do we?

Also practicing colouring.

Um

I know my blog background immensely sucks, but I am bored. Sorry for your eyes. It's hard to find something that can fill a whole background, look nice, and still be less than 300KB in size. I'll figure it out, eventually. For now, stick with the pink.

I feel tempted to rant about the utter dejection I feel about what one of my tutors has said about my work, but I probably shouldn't, lest I regret my emotional outburst later. Besides, it's 3AM, meaning I should sleep.

Bechdel Test, pt. 6 (I think I'm done)

I think I've got this down pat.

To reiterate, my project is on the Bechdel test. Of course, it's in no way an indication of the quality or feminist subtext of the work; it simply shows that, in the fact that a surprisingly large amount of mainstream works fail the test, that the exclusion of works that do pass the test is deliberate on the part of the powers that control mainstream media, which is still a largely male-controlled and -dominated industry.

My project is in no way meant to disparage men, or even women. It's not meant to be a malicious attack on any agenda. My intention is to simply show - both to myself, a female brought up on and a fan of many mainstream works that don't pass the test - and to others - that interesting female characters in interesting environments are possible without having to resort to putting them under a masculine ideal or resigned to stereo-typically 'female-oriented'  territory.

A positive reinforcement, one might say.

Hopefully the text added helps to give more context and depth to the illustrations. I really struggled to come up with what I thought would be appropriate.

Om nom

OMG! First post of the year! Huzzah!

Well, there's a work-in-progress show coming up soon and apparently there will be an opportunity to sell some zines. My flatmates and I have decided to collaborate and make a calendar for the new year - considering the fact we kind of need one anyway since we obviously threw the old one out and the living room needs some sprucing up.

And of course being the gushy fangirls we are, it was no contest the theme would be hot guys. So we got three months and therefore three guys each. No prizes for guessing who they are! We'll be screenprinting them, so hopefully I've got this all right...

What a surprise, huh? I actually have only seen him in X-Men: First Class, but his angsty tortured  anti-hero/anti-villain multilingual Magneto was enough to make me love him instantly. Plus, he tends to spend most of his roles in suits looking suave and smokin' (literally and the other one).

I had the most trouble with Mr. Fassbender - I just find his face really hard to draw for some reason. The above was my fourth drawing, and even then it took a few hours of editing in Photoshop (and a few bouts of hair-pulling) to get it to a point I was happy with.

Also, that's probably a really stupid quote to choose considering all he's said, but I couldn't resist. I'll let you find its context!

A very recent falling-in-love. I watched I Saw the Devil a month back and couldn't help wondering: "Who is this deep-voiced, intense, angular man? Must...wiki..."

He's apparently very famous in Korea (some of you would probably know him as the villain from The Good, the Bad, and the Weird), and has a role in the GI Joe movies as Storm Shadow. Gosh, I remember when the The Rise of Cobra came out, my dad tried to drag me to watch it with him. I adamantly refused (it obviously being a stupid action-flick) and went to watch Orphan with my mom instead. In retrospect, if I knew such a specimen of manhood was in GI Joe (no, Channing Tatum doesn't count, blah) I would have let myself be happily dragged along. Well, its sequel is coming out soon, so there's my chance!

Yeah, you saw this coming, didn't you? When I answer people's questions as to my celebrity crush, he will always be the first name on my lips. I'll get a quirked eyebrow.

"Isn't that the guy who freaked out on the set of Terminator?"

"Yeah."

"Have you seen American Psycho? He like, kills prostitutes and stuff."

"Yes, I have seen it. I thought it was brilliant. I have also read the book."

--

So, it seems I have a thing for angular features, a nice jaw, suits, an intense demeanor and a propensity for brutal violence. Um. Should I be signing up for a shrink?

Bechdel Test, pt. 5

Last one for today, I promise!

This one's just a compilation of scenes I brainstormed:

Epic/fantastical/dramatic situations that pass the test

Mundane/everyday situations that would pass the test. (Some of them are from my own personal experience, ho-ho)

Situations that wouldn't pass the test, but I think women would appreciate

Bechdel Test, pt. 4

Wow, this is really racking up, isn't it? Anyway, I wanted to showcase one more example I think passes this test really well. I'll probably sound like a giant dork right now for saying it's a video game I've been obsessed with lately, Dragon Age 2.

There's one character, Isabela, who is, um, quite promiscuous, but that's not all there is to her. She is a rogue, and the pirate captain of a ship that has sunk, and she spends the majority of the game looking for a new ship. She's devious, cunning, and selfish, and doesn't care much for other things outside of how she'd personally benefit from them. She's witty and very funny, and can be occasionally compassionate and caring. I personally don't like her too much, but I can believe she can be a real person and I'm happy with that.

In this game, one's gender doesn't come strongly into play in terms of opportunities or how you're treated. Hawke, the protagonist, can either be played as a male or female character, and outside of that there's also Aveline, who eventually becomes captain of the city guard, and Meredith, the leader of the templars. Meredith is extremely powerful, but is also kind of crazy, and loses her sanity and becomes an eventual villain at the end of the game.

In that regard, I like that the female characters are diverse (they can be good or evil, friends or rivals, allies or enemies, and everything in between, much like Lauren Faust's quote) and that there's no normative 'male' default. There are random people in positions of power such as guards and assassins that are women, and no one questions that. All of these women, regardless of whether you like them or not, are given the opportunity to be equally as competent (or incompetent, in some cases) as their male counterparts.

Another thing I appreciate is the costume design. They look functional and practical; something I could envision women of their occupation would actually wear. While they can be sexy, you certainly don't get the vibe that they're trying hard to make them look so.

So, I thought I'd give creating my own characters a go...

Bechdel Test, pt. 3

On more positive notes, I do really like this quote by Lauren Faust. She's the creative force behind My Little Pony: Friendship Is Magic (which I watched as part of my research...honest...it's actually really good!).

"There are lots of different ways to be a girl. You can be sweet and shy, or bold and physical. You can be silly and friendly, or reserved and studious. You can be strong and hard working, or artistic and beautiful. This show is wonderfully free of “token girl” syndrome, so there is no pressure to shove all the ideals of what we want our daughters to be into one package. There is a diversity of personalities, ambitions, talents, strengths and even flaws in our characters – it’s not an army of cookie-cutter nice-girls or cookie-cutter beauty queens like you see in most shows for girls."

Another shining example is Avatar: The Last Airbender. Its female characters are wonderfully well-rounded; they kick ass, but are also full of flaws and traits that are complex and make them engaging characters.

I kind of did a fun little doodle on what I envisioned characters based on Faust's quote would look like:

Bechdel Test, pt. 2

I should let you know, I'm a bitter, bitter person. I hate many things. I hate Frank Miller. Yes, I know he did The Dark Knight Returns (which I will say is amazingly written) and I have heard good things about Sin City, but after you've seen The Spirit and read All-Star Batman and Robin (oh, you know, the one where he kidnaps 12-year-old Dick Grayson and calls him retarded because he doesn't know that he's 'the goddamn Batman) you'll realize Mr. Miller has gone off the deep end and definitely cannot write female characters (outside of Carrie Kelly, to his credit).

Here's his script to penciller Jim Lee for the above page of Vicki Vale in All-Star Batman and Robin:

"Okay Jim, I'm shameless. Let's go with an ASS shot. Panties detailed. Balloons from above. She's walking, restless as always. We can't take our eyes off her. Especially since she's got one fine ass."

I'm not against sexualizing women (after all, we do have sexuality) but when it's done in such a degrading way that this one aspect is the only thing that defines her characterization - a sex object - it really frustrates me. Especially since the marketing of female superheroes can sometimes be based heavily on her sex appeal as opposed to, oh...other things. I imagine if males were sexualized in the same way it would definitely expose the inherent ridiculousness of it all. Thus:

I'll apologize now for scarring you all forever. But hey, he's got one fine ass, so that makes it all okay, doesn't it?

Bechdel Test, pt. 1

My new project is on the Bechdel Test (Google it please, dear friend). Basically it tests female presence in a work (movie, TV show, book, graphic novel, etc.) But I'm also exploring it in a broader spectrum. I'll explain later, but I wanted to post some visuals I'd done.

Since I tend to babble on and I'll be ranting on several topics I'll split in into parts.

These two 'strong women' were inspired (should I even use that word...) by Sucker Punch. Basically, Sucker Punch passes the Bechdel Test with flying colours, but I felt cheated when I watched it.

I find it masquerades itself as 'female empowerment' when it is anything but, and Zack Snyder seems to think 'feminism' = girls wielding guns being super-violent and fighting back in a world where they're oppressed by evil, evil men while wearing skimpy outfits and sultry expressions. If anything, it perpetuates the Hollywood notion that girl power can only be girl power under a masculine ideal.

This is perfectly satirized in this strip of Hark! A Vagrant!

To be perfectly fair, the movie is horrible on its own terms. I hated 300. If Sucker Punch consisted of a solely male cast, I still would have hated it. I hate Zack Snyder and his overly-CGIed, gratuitous slow-mo. I could go on and on, but I won't. Not now, anyway.

Pretty pretty flowers

Just randomly realized that I did actually submit two drawings to last year's Lloyds competition. I do actually like this one better (mainly because of the colours), but I can see why it didn't get selected. This was another interpretation of 'we make it simple'. She's cutting away the weeds to get a beautiful garden, can't you see? Ho-ho! How clever. Ho-ho. Obviously they were equally as unimpressed as I was.