Archive for the ‘Miscellaneous’ Category

Food Contest: Halftime

Thursday, March 6th, 2025

For the fifth consecutive year, Bernard and I are competing in a postcard contest. With the same five judges as last year the category this time is food.

This year we’re using markers only – no pencil sketches! – and I printed cards featuring lovely AI art of girls eating. While the ten subjects – most chosen by judges – are all types of food, there is no requirement to literally depict the subject: images evocative of or inspired by are acceptable ok. At least that was the theory…

Fruit

Mine is on the left, and Bernard’s on the right. Immediately we both learned how shockingly poor quality the markers were! The colour distribution is strange, they bleed a bit onto the postcard, and they change colour as they dry. I suppose I shouldn’t have simply purchased the cheapest option, but $8 for 40 markers was a deal only a fool would have ignored!

As for the art, I wish I’d done a sunset background instead of blue (which dried darker than it looked when drawing), and Bernard’s leaves I think also suffered from colour changing.

To our surprise this first category was a tie: we each scored 7.5 points (each judge divides 3 points between the two pics)! Individual judges had preferences, but in the end the scores were even. Here’s some of their comments:

“Both good but flawed. Left pic is wallpaper-like or even stained-glass window-like, except the fruit isn’t uniform. Right pic is more striking, while having size problems and missing a shadow.”
“Love the stained-glass motif but left seemed less fruit centric. Love the blue.”
“I like the stained-glass window effect of the first picture with the checkerboard style contrasting. The structure and balance of form and colour are very well done. The second picture is pleasing in its simplicity with clever use of negative space and a modernised with the black outlines and stylised shadowing.”

Pasta

Mine is left and Bernard’s right. I hated mine. The spaghetti was extremely difficult to render with the markers, and none of the colours were quite right. I added an ‘Italian’ background but the green dried lighter and it looks silly. I was positive I’d lose… but then I got Bernard’s in the mail and suddenly wasn’t so sure!

The judges preferred mine, and I won 8.1 to 6.9. The comments suggested they liked our efforts better than we did! Here’s what they said:

“I marvel at the technical artistry in the left picture. The fork full of fettuccine is so well executed I feel like I could lean in and take a bite from the plate. Right ois a visual magnet. The combination of colours and forms is so attractive it should be gracing the front of an Italian postcard or advertising your favourite Italian restaurant.”
“Left is good but it’s a bit bland and boring.”
“Both pictures were made with longing. Made by a person really longed to see a pasta.”

Hamburger

Bernard is left and me right. I was keenly aware mine was a risk, but I felt Hamburglar was as iconic to ‘hamburger’ as a simple depiction. I was even going to draw him without any burgers, and in retrospect wish I had. I was very proud at the likeness, and was happy had the correct colours as well.

The judges were confused, and I got a couple of questions asking if mine was even allowed! Even after explaining this wasn’t supposed to be a simple ‘drawings of food’ contest they greatly preferred Bernard’s (unquestionably well rendered) literal depiction, and he won 10.3 to 4.7 in the contests first blowout!

“The left hamburger looks delicious. Two all beef patties special sauce lettuce cheese pickled onions on a sesame seed bun!!!!! I will remember that phrase till the day I die I think. Right is disappointing. I don’t want to eat those hamburgers!!”
“The Hamburglar pic is cute, but there’s so much more burger to the other one.”
“What’s the green stripe in left?”

Ramen

Mine is right, Bernard left. I went with a pop-arty approach, and traced around inverted glasses to get perfect circles. I half based mine on a reference photo but felt noodles were essential and added many more, as well as two naruto. I was happy with it, and personally felt Bernard’s – while well drawn – was lacking in actual ramen!

He scored a narrow victory with 7.3 to my 6.7. The judges were torn with two ties and it came down to one of them to cast the decider. Their comments:

“Both are great and could be T-shirt designs or something. If I had to pick a fault, the bowl on the right is maybe a tad too stylised.”
“While left is more traditional the modern twist of right is superb.”
“Left just had more… soul? Also broth, key ingredient to ramen. Kudos to the spiral fish cakes though on right.”
“I like the egg yolk on the left but it looks quite rushed. The meat color for the right is too pink and it looks too flat and lacks toppings, but I like the cartoon approach.”

Cereal

Mine is left, Bernard is right. I’m proud that I didn’t use any reference photo. I held a box of Raisin Bran as a model, and labored over the transparency of the bag which was a big challenge due to the markers. When I received Bernard’s I was impressed, but I felt it was a bit ‘safe’ and had a feeling by this point risks would be noticed by the judges. The fact we both used fruit loops was a coincidence.

The judges overwhelmingly preferred mine, and I won 10.45 to 4.55. Some comments:

“So much detail in left. I love the colours and perspective and the splashing of the milk. While right is nice it just pales besides the obvious effort taken in left.”
“I like the dynamic splash of the milk on the left, although right has something of a seriousness/still life quality to it. Did you guys align on fruit loops before starting?”
“Funny that the actual cereals are so similar. Left pic is very dynamic, and I have to award it more points.”

With one tie and two wins each we’re now tied at the halfway point! This is a challenging contest – food is much more difficult to draw than previous categories – and it’s absolutely anyone’s game at this point.

Come back in six weeks or so to see who wins!

Zoffy Hunting

Sunday, January 5th, 2025

That’s a vintage Star Wars figure, carded, in fantastic condition for ‘only’ about $190 US dollars. If this had been R2D2 then I wouldn’t have hesitated to buy it for this price, which is much less than it would typically sell for in the west.

That’s a Five Star Stories model kit for ¥55,000, or about $350 US dollars. This is of course a professionally assembled and painted example, but if I were to buy the kit I’d hardly be able to make it much less paint it, and I’d be out $350!

This is one of the weird things about shopping the otaku shops here: the prices. Occasionally items that seem like they should be expensive aren’t at all, and then you see things you’d imagine were basically trash that are for sale at insane prices (such as a single Danganronpa trading card we saw today for ¥10,000).

After a quick trip to Shibuya to get KLS a new release cosmetic (which released today!) we returned to Akihabara for the usual hijinks, and were out after dark visiting the arcades and finishing our shopping.

It’s always a struggle of space and weight, shopping here, and yesterday I saw an item with a box larger than our suitcases and I actually spent some time theorizing how to buy it and get it home. Ultimately reason prevailed!

At the last minute I saw a wonderful Zoffy figure that I ‘needed’ but it was used and unboxed, so I began a mad scramble around Akiba once again to find a new version. While I would ultimately not succeed, it was during this adventure that I discovered an even better Zoffy figurine I hadn’t even known existed:

It’s big, and so is the box, but it’s now packed 🙂

Since we’re going home tomorrow this will be the last blog entry from this trip. I’m sure once we’ve had a chance to unpack and unwind I’ll post about some of my pickups, but for now I’ll sign off from this, my 16th visit to Japan!

Bonus: KLS Posing For ‘Quick Snaps’

Tuesday, December 31st, 2024

An advert for a host bar on a street near Sakae, Nagoya.

An ad for a mobile game in Nagoya station.

Nagoyan pork katsu mascot. This pig is a common sight in Nagoya.

At SCMAGLEV as part of the exhibit showcasing the race (in a manga) between Cyborg 009 and a bullet train.

Posing with two ‘Onsen girls’ in Kawaguchiko.

At the Disney art collab in Shibuya.

At the Ultraman Expo at Tokyo Dome.

Posing with the two leads from Ultraman Arc.

Tokyo-A-Go-Go!

Monday, December 30th, 2024

We left Nagoya at first light, and this was providential since after our first train we were able to board the limited ‘Kaiji’ train and complete the return trip to Tokyo first class!

We’re staying in Akihabara for the next week, and after dumping out carry-ons luggage (and being reunited with our big luggage we had shipped to the hotel) it was time for lunch and some shopping.

We went to Shibuya, and spent a few hours looking in shops and making some purchases. The above photo was taken at a popup shop/exhibition of official Disney art by an illustrator. They had a section where attendees could write on post-it notes and stick them on a large wall. The face is of the artists design of a Mickey Mouse inspired girl. Her art was very good, and amongst the products for sale were large framed reproductions for ¥1,000,000 each!

Eventually we returned to Akiba to check in to our room, and it seems we got the best view in the hotel! We overlook the avenue out of the station, with the Radiokaikan building on the right. This is the main entry into Akiba, an iconic location, and during the day usually full of people.

More shopping followed, including a very special purchase for tomorrow. Details will follow…

Elongates: Distant Shores

Thursday, November 14th, 2024

As I’ve said these penny squashing machines aren’t unique to the USA, and the collection includes pennies from seven other countries.

The above were all collected during our German trip back in 2015. They came from at least four cities, so we must have found quite a few machines during our trip. I don’t remember pressing most of the above; perhaps Bernard made them himself?

A cursory inspection shows these to look more or less identical to the US-pressed coins, but these aren’t actually pressed pennies. Instead the machines in Germany (and most foreign countries) use blanks the same size and material (I think) as US pennies so they look the same when made. You simply feed coins in to pay, and the machine drops the blank into the die itself.

The above all came from England, and again were obtained in various cities. These are a bit different from the German ones since they use real coins: specifically British pennies!

I neglected to mention until now, but sometimes the machines press both sides of the coin. In the examples I have, the reverse is always the name of the attraction or shop in which the penny was pressed. The various pennies from The London Eye I own have pictorial fronts with no logo, but as you can see they put that on the back. These are perhaps the most detailed backs on any of the pennies in the collection.

Some of these Irish pennies are hilariously low quality: as if the machine was broken and not applying enough pressure. I’ve only got six but they’re all from different locations which intrigued me since I wonder what the other designs in the machines must have been since I pressed only one?

That’s the sixth Irish one (not in the previous pick) and looking at the reverse it seems this is also a real coin, specifically a 5 euro cent coin. We saw puffins when we visited Ireland, but our puffin experience in Scotland were much better.

Speaking of Scotland, these four were obtained there. Once again these are British pennies, and once again they all came from different locations which leaves me wondering why I pressed only one at each machine.

Urquhart Castle stands on the shores of Loch Ness, and we visited back on June 9, 2018 which is when I must have pressed this penny. Pressed pennies are often blurry or imperfect, probably because the die has worn down over the years or is slightly misaligned, but this one from Urquhart is unusually fine and detailed. It’s impressive compared to many I’ve showcased so far, but the best will come tomorrow.

By the way, do you still have the Nessie postcard?

I’ll end today with these three, which are amongst the few in the collection not originally collected by me. Obviously from New Zealand, these seem to have been pressed from blanks and not actual coins. To repeat my previous statement, we’ll see more like this tomorrow…