oh oh where has the time gone said saicoink. // 12:40 p.m. - Monday, April 19, 2004
Good gracious me! I was feeling nostaligic so I decided to update this Bella Torta blog that has been dead since 2003 of last year. How the time flies when school takes over your life.
Recently I've been drawing again. I'm going to eat you madness and He is so great are some of the works I've drawn recently. I want to draw comics again. Well, school will be over soon so then I can move on to that direction. I'm really looking forward to it. I want to create a work that is similar to Japanese kashibon - books that were rented with pretty cover but mediocre / average art. That is what I'm capable of. I want to create a comic about human relationships - complicated ones that have no meaning. I want to draw a story with an evil girl and one who is moody. I sent Jordyn some illustrations of that by mail. I wonder if she will get it. I need to write Kei a snail mail letter next, Thao too. I already laid out the stationary. I'll get to it this weekend??
k.. kim...? is it really you? // 11:46 p.m. - Tuesday, August 5, 2003
It's been forever since I've written here and it's hard to explain why, but anyhow, I am back, and finally taking my turn, I suppose. It's just been a large writer's block, I think.
So to celebrate my return I think I will be writing more often and ignoring the turn-taking An and I originally started with... This will probably keep this journal more alive as well... heh.
And finally I have something to write about... Tying in on the topic of idol groups and D&D, I'll to single out ex-D&D member, Olivia Lufkin. I am usually behind on all jpop news, so I was visiting a fansite of hers the other day and found out the interesting fact that she recently (?) broke into the fashion industry with a friend named Kozue Rin. They started a label called "Black Daisy Ville" and they are hard at work for Fall and Spring lines. I immediately started searching for BDV products online, being a fan of Olivia's style.
This search brought me back into my old love for fashion and I started hunting all over the place for girls' fashions, particularily for certain japanese clothing brands that I used to follow online (of course, being poor, I never bought these clothings, online or real life).
One in particular is "bulle de savon" (link). They make more simple, casual type clothing for the more mature yéyé girl, I suppose. I really like their clean cut blouses and skirts, and the patterns they use are adorable~~ There is of course the usual H. Naoto (link) stuff that is Oh So Popular. Olivia also wears a brand called MILK that makes really neat shirts, but that link has been eaten somewhere in my bookmarks... There is another funky t-shirt designer called Graffiti Bunny (link) that I found though.
I found a lot of cool brand by searching for japanese fashion magazines like Non-no (link, there is a fun clothing matchup flash game there somewhere) and CUTiE (link). At the CUTiE site was a link to their shopping guidebook or something, which led me to the Takarajima Channel Shopping Guide... or something.. Pardon my ignorance but I'm not really sure what the site is because I can't read the language... What I DO know from context is that you are able to look at a lot of the recent trends in clothing and accessories by looking at all the shopping guides, CUTiE brand for the yéyés, Spring and Mini for the conservative women, and Smart for the boys. I certainly spent a lot of time exploring that site, LoL.
I naturally of course also searched EBay for stuff that I could actually buy and discovered by looking at both these sources that there was a lot of stuff I could imitate and make for myself... So right now I am on a huge DIY kick and I wish I could sew. If I didn't have a drawing block right now I could be churning out a lot of new sketches too. I am wanting to get materials for silkscreen printing but I know it would cost a lot.
My excitement about fashion lately makes me wonder if I would have been successful in that kind of industry. With the free time I have now, I will be definitely exploring more.
Some more notable links that I found on the search for DIY stuff... They don't really fit anywhere, and are kind of just random, but enjoyable. Meomi.com - I'm not so sure how I came to this site but it's very sickeningly cute and hard to resist... Yumiyah.com - A DIY site. She makes bags and other accessories. Though I can't say I am such an absolute fan of all her stuff, there are a few notables, and her Links list to all things DIY is huuuuuuge, and that is admirable. Thinking back, I think this is where I found the Meomi site... Antisocialxbrat.com - I don't really like the name of the site, haha... but there are lots of buttons at reasonable shipping prices.. For some reason, even though there are a million websites like this, lots that are better designed, I get the gut feeling that this one is more honest, for some reason. Girl's intuition. They have Sleater-Kinney buttons! Genkigang.com - they make FLEECE HATS. Look at the ORANGE HAT. (O_O) AAAAAAAA
aaaand... yes, that should be it for today. See you all later.
the olive jacket wearing emo glass girl! // 09:00 p.m. - Tuesday, April 1, 2003
Can you guess who this is? Of course it is ME, saicoink. Kei doesn't wear olive jackets. I think she has EMO glasses too.
This design is indeed a tribute to D&D, the only (?) idol group that both Kei and I like. Kei doesn't like idol groups much but I've been listening to and ENJOYING it for a while now. I pretty much live off CDs and will listen to anything. There are a lot of non-Japanese groups/bands/artists that I like too, but I've been focusing on Japanese music for the past few years. O_O
Anyway! I'll post some mp3s of this Eurobeat group in a few days. I need to rip some CDs for it, so it will take a while. And please give comments later on when they are up so that Kei and I can tell how you think of the tacky music.
For a while now I've been wanting to make a page about J-pop girl groups. (^^; It has been a sort of weird interest of mine. These kind of girl groups with young girls, usually middle school or high school age, has been put under a lot of criticism because of the Lolita complex that is identified with a lot of Japanese men. I don't know about the guys that enjoy this kind of music, but for me and for other female non-Japanese fans I know, we like these groups because we enjoy the music. Sometimes it feels kind of weird to hear that the music I like is some part of Lolicon culture in Japan.
In comparison to the 80s though, there is a larger number of idols in the mid-90s to recent times that are a lot better at singing and definitely have a lot more personality. Also, they don't all look the same. Trust me on this.
Sorry for the rant. I hope that it was interesting to read anyway. See you all someday later.
it's definitely kim // 01:07 a.m. - Monday, March 31, 2003
okay! the new layout is finished. bless you, spring break. lovely lovely lovely.
so it seems bellatorta is reopening again. weird.
just a little info - An asked me to make a D&D (dance and dream) layout. D&D are a jp*p band from in the late 90s that had three members - olivia, aya, and chika (try to guess which on is which) that had kind of.. generic europop music. but because we are weird, we liked them... D&D broke up after a few years (i'm not sure exactly how many?)... aya and chika went along to do some work together, and released a couple of singles, but disappeared after (i hope they didn't become office ladies). olivia (yeah, she's a lufkin) went on to do a solo carreer (that has MPD) but is kind of laying low right now. olivia makes a better model than a singer IMO, but you know what? it doens't matter. cos we're guilty fans of her, still. LoL.
that's all for tonight. stripedsocks.pitas.com will eventually get a new layout soon too, i think. probably an olivia one too, if i can't come up with a good design-based.. design.
kei or kim? // 12:47 a.m. - Monday, March 31, 2003
are we testing with comments?
An? is this font too big?
kim or kei? // 12:40 a.m. - Monday, March 31, 2003
are we testing?
