A little update

Hi all~

I haven't been on this blog for quite a while now... *forgot existence cough cough*

Once I get my university, exhibition and work situations sorted I will start updating this blog again.

Thanks to people that bother to go to this blog! :D

Hope to see you guys soon. xx

School has started!

This week, yes. Classes have finally started. Constantly feeling tired but nonetheless I am pretty much happy about things. The timetables have been really hectic this week with times being wrong and turning up an hour early, not knowing which room the class is held in, etc etc... The list goes on. But hopefully everything will be sorted out by next week, in which case half of the timetable has. But in any case, lots of drawings to do with very few hours in a day. Buh.
So anyway, I'll get into the raid for today, in which I'll be reviewing a Danish music CD, woot! Feels so good to be listening to Danish music again. *has terrible internet speed at home*

Raid 25: Dansk Melodi Grand Prix 2010 Review
Looked at the Danish charts yesterday and saw that this one was number one! Oh yes. Though the CD only consists of 10 songs along with their karaoke versions, the compilation as a whole was easy to listen to and can be listened to along with any mood (I usually listen to it when I bike to school). And it helped that the majority of the songs were in English since my Danish still needs lots pf practice! ^^;; With artists such as Bryan Rice and groups such as Sukkerchok and MariaMatilde Band, there's a good range. I particularly liked Sukkerchok's song 'Kæmper for kærlighed'; it has an addictive beat and a chorus that wants you to get up and dance. Sukkerchok have always been quite talented and I first heard them on Danish radio P5000 and this is when I get kinda disappointed that European music never make it outside of Europe for others to enjoy. If you want a CD that has both relaxing music and fun Danish pop, this is definitely worth a listen.

An extremely brief review, sorry... Next time I'll be doing a review for a New Zealand band! Midnight Youth's album 'The Brave Don't Run' did pretty well in the Vodafone NZ Music Awards last year and I finally got my hands on the album! So for this one I'll write a proper review.
So until then, ciao ciao~

Lovin' the half pipe!

Raid 24: Vancouver Winter Olympics 2010
One raid for today, the entire topic being about the the Winter Olympics in Vancouver. It's on everybody's lips and it would be stupid not to mention it, unless you're not the type that watches these things. In that case I wouldn't read this, but if you're fully into it like myself, keep on reading for my pointless opinion. xD
I'd never thought to watch the winter olympics since I only focused on the summer one, but I would say the winter one is SO much better. :-) There may be more events in the summer one but winter has that vibe to it; I feel cold just watching it, though it's the good kind of cold that you feel when you're on the top of a snowy mountain and the breeze touches your face. *ahem* The point is, I think there's more adrenalin in the winter games, but of course it's only my opinion and everyone is free to agree or disagree.

Aside from that, the competition is so fierce (lol) in the winter games! I especially love the half pipe and watch it from the early morning until New Zealand TV decides to switch to something else while my Mum likes figure skating. The New Zealand team didn't get to the finals but they were all wonderful to watch and felt very proud. Kendall Brown was good, and she came 9th in the semi-finals which was really good.^^ The weird thing about our athletes is that they manage to make it to the semi-finals but they just miss the finals by a small fraction. It's a cure I tell you!! Still, it's amazing to watch and whether out team gets anywhere or not it's great to see everyone do their best and kick ass!
Speaking of kicking ass, Shaun White definitely kicked ass in the half-pipe. He already had the gold medal in the bag but he showed off his epicness and got the crowd going wild! It was stunning to watch and it feels awesome even to witness it. Congratulations! If you missed it, click here to watch it on Youtube.^_^

Ok, my raiding is done for the week. Next week I'll probably do another rant about the olympics but I'll add another raid after it. Which reminds me, classes start next week...! My electives are on too! I was lucky enough to get into concept art and illustration, yay! Very excited.
Anyway, I'll leave it here. Later, guys!

First post of 2010... Finally.

This blog originally started as a school project that had to be updated because if it wasn't I'd pretty much fail the course. xD But since I've gotten this far I might as well keep going, although VRO has had an unannounced hiatus for a while... I apologise to the people that actually bother to come here. ^^;
So pretending that never happened, I shall continue with my life as a ridiculously broke student and continue raiding for more information! ^_^ So today I have two raids, both about my home country New Zealand.

Raid 22: Yellow chocolate is here!!
New Zealanders have always been good at inventing things and such, examples being the electric fence, trampolines with a safety barrier and splitting the atom (although that's not an invention but hey). So we have come up with another idea, unnecessary yes, but an invention nontheless. I watched the news to hear about all this yellow chocolate business and they were going along the streets of Auckland and getting people to try it. Most said it either tasted of bananas and pineapples and some said it tasted similar to pineapple lumps which is a Kiwi classic consisting of a small, hard square block of pineapple confectionary that is covered in chocolate. Since it's sold in supermarkets that I go nowhere near I haven't tried it yet but definitely will. Next week maybe...?

Raid 23: Cows, cows, everywhere!
New Zealand is famously known for having a sheep population that's bigger than the amount of people living here but I just heard on the radio about half an hour ago that we have officially been beaten by cows as well. Cows. Could see it coming though. There's only 4 million living here but seriously! We have a similar population to Denmark (approx. 5 million) and they don't have a problem!! *unneccessarily brings Denmark into it*
But we do have a really big dairy industry. We have several universities dedicated to agriculture. So naturally foreigners have the image of farmers in short shorts, a checkered shirt and gumboots riding on a tractor while sheepdogs are running around in every direction. Footrot Flats (a famous NZ comic which has finished now) is a very good example. But personally, I'd rather live in a place with a large amount of animals and green than in a city with gray buildings, gray ground and gray water.

School is starting in two weeks so am definitely looking forward to it since as well as our normal classes, we have electives! ^_^ We get to choose two, and I chose Illustration and Concept Art. I really wish web design was an elective... A person last year asked if typography would be an elective and my entire class laughed. We hate typography like it's the plague.

I shall leave it here for today and I'll have more raids next week! Ciao everyone~

Holidays have started, woohoo!

It's finally the holidays. It's not like I don't like to attend classes since they're fun, but it's also nice to get a break from it since it can really do your head in. -_-; So now I'm focusing my holidays on drawing lots of illustrations and drawing whatever the hell I like for once! xD ... And working on my manga I'm sending over to Japan to be put in a Hetalia anthology. And the deadline is looming so I'd like to complete it by the end of the holidays and then send it over in the post. Which is always exciting since it feels pretty good to send away a finished product but I always have the worry that it might not get there (lol). Every time I've sent one it has though. I usually send things by uploading it onto a private server since it's a lot easier and I complete my manga digitally, but there are occasions when you have to send things over. Not that I mind.
Anyway, enough about that, onto this week's raids.

Raid 20: New Illustration

OMG, the 20th raid!! That calls for celebration. So I bring you an illustration. A Denmark x Norway illustration! For some reason since the last holidays I've gotten a lot faster at drawing and before it took quite some hours to complete anything, but this one only took one morning. O.o And I slept in. I tried to do something different since I seem to do the same kind of thing each time so I added a checkered background and whatnot. The characters are in a slightly blue tinge as well. If you look closely. Can kinda see why it didn't take that long, considering the effects were pretty much done in seconds and minutes. It's about the execution though, right? :3
The idea for the illustration was slightly taken from the music video for Hatsune Miku's song 'Black Rock Shooter', which is going to be talked about in my next raid.
Well, hope you like! ^_^

Raid 21: Black Rock Shooter the ANIMATION!!

For those that love the song, love the video and love the Miku look-a-like to bits, there's going to be an animation made for her!! It's at first going to make a pilot which is set to be available in... October. I think. Which will be very exciting! Since it's a pilot, the animation quality will be top-notch. It will be interesting to see what it's about and what kind of characters are going to appear. Black Rock Shooter has a very nice aesthetic about it, with checkered backgrounds and the repetition of using blue and black as its main colours gives it a nice cool, mysterious look to it. For those that like huke-san's work should check out the website of the artist which can be found on the Supercell website.

That's all for today, and I'm not sure what the next raids will be about... But Muse has released a new album and Basshunter is about to release a new album as well so I'm looking forward to having as listen. Oh, and Rammstein is going to release a new album in October! Yeeesss...!!! Their new single 'Pussy' is out now. xD
Hasta luego~

'Maya' is so confusing.

Seriously, with all the buttons and whatnot everywhere, it's practically impossible to use everything. I just started using it today for class and we're having a tutorial on it, and it's actually pretty fun! I really want to make the ship I drew in illustration class for our project that's due in today. Now all that's left is the art history essay and our storyboards....-_-; Can't wait 'till everything is done so I can start drawing Hetalia characters again! >v<

Raid 19: Hetalia US x UK VIDEO!!
...Yeah, well, I'm starting to run out of things to talk about. But this video is really awesome. The drawings are so detailed and beautiful and goes very well with the song and is a great laugh, as well as it being so cute! It has elements of BL, so if you don't know the meaning of it or don't like it, don't watch. Flaming is very 20th century. So, enjoy! This isn't the subbed version but is available on Youtube somewhere.

CP: Hetalia -Amercia x England
Language: Japanese
Song Track: 'World is Mine' -Hatsune Miku

I'll leave it here, and next week I'll post some illustrations on Pixiv!! Hopefully.
Ciao ciao~ >v<

September!!

...It's on the second I'm posting this but I can't believe it's September already... I say it in practically every month since the days go past like a jetplane and I can't keep up. T_T
Although I hear that's the same for other people, especially people in the School of Art and Design like I am. Since we always have so many projects and there's never enough time to draw anything, the days go by in a flash and the next thing you know it's the end of term, end of the semester, etc. Which I'm finding now, since I have about 5 projects to go (finished about 2 previously) and there's only two more weeks until the 3rd term is over. In New Zealand we have 4 terms and 2 semesters, 2 terms in each semester dividing it in half.
But yeah, I've drabbled enough about myself now. Onto some raids!! >v<

Raid 18: CO2PENHAGEN

...Huh. It turned itself into a subscript. Anyway, CO2PENHAGEN is the world's first CO2 neutral festival!! ...Trust Denmark to do something like this. xD Which is great really. People who are conscious about the environment would be concerned about the amount of energy used up just to have a concert for a day (like myself, who is going to see Basshunter in New Zealand lol), but there's no need to worry for this event.
Held from September 4~6, it will feature art, culture, bands, and many more events. There will be people performing such as:
Dúné (yeeesss!!!)
Camille Jones
Rebound Rubies feat. Ida Aida & Lizzie
...just to name a few. And there's going to be a cycle parade! CYCLE PARADE!!! >v<

Why is Copenhagen made of such awesomeness? God I wanna live there so bad. Will be living there when I graduate, but until then must be patient...! Would also like to go to Roskilde, Køge, Århus, etc... Just jump around the islands. One day. But still love Zealand the best. It's kinda funny 'cos I live in New Zealand and am going to Zealand. It's a weird feeling.
Jeg elsker Sjælland!!

... So I'll leave it here until the next raid, which will probably be about Denmark again, 'cos nothing happens here. Seriously.