Yer man in Japan

sketch

2011-01-12T04:46:00.001-08:00

trex renders

2011-01-09T00:12:00.001-08:00

The Wrestler

2011-01-08T16:50:00.001-08:00

character made in Blender

New Trex Sculpt

2010-12-01T20:08:00.001-08:00

Continuing from an old lo-res model, high poly model made with Sculptris and Blender 2.5

Ireland: Lost child on paddys day

2010-08-22T02:18:00.001-07:00

I was just looking through some old photos. I took this on Paddys day a good few years ago Just after the parade had ended. A Garda helping a lost child.This is generally my image of the gardai, approachable, friendly and genuinely guardians of the peace. I've been away a good few years, I hope next time I'm back its still the same.

Wrestler model

2010-08-16T07:41:00.001-07:00

Made in Blender 2.5. I decided to learn blender. Its great and its free.
http://www.blender.org/

sketch

2009-11-23T01:08:00.001-08:00

we amuse ourselves in work by occasionally randomly generating characters to draw. roll dice and from a list of attributes you get your character. Female 20's shop assistant MONSTER!

一万円ぐらいで自分でワコムCINTINQを作れますか？

2009-11-14T07:32:00.000-08:00

信じられないですがこのイギリス人Drewはそれをしました。古いワコムをばらばらにして新しいLCD画面の内臓上に乗せてそして新しいケースの中に入れる。　簡単そうです。たまにケーブルを伸ばす必要はあります、でもそんなに難しくない。。。。　
http://www.bongofish.co.uk/wacom/wacom_pt1.html

全部は英語ですが写真はいっぱい。Forumでさまざまな人は自分でCintiqぽい機会を作っている。もちろん本物のワコムが一番いいですが、作るのは楽しいそう。Forumでさまざまな不思議でかっこいい
ものもある。
ワコムの一番大きいCintiqより大きい画面。

油絵をまねしている木でつくられているケース

アップルノートとCintiqの子供。

English teaching Comission

2009-11-07T06:52:00.000-08:00

A piece of work, I had to make a series of Farside Style cartoons as part of English teaching marketing material.

Drawing again

2009-03-31T07:25:00.000-07:00

After not drawing at all for a many many years I have decied to try and get back in practice again. Hopefully by airing this cack handed rubbish on my blog I will shame myself into making a decent effort. these are just some bizarre doodles.

2009-03-21T23:05:00.001-07:00

I've made a small blog/website for my university project.
A game called "the Mystery of the Sacred Grove"
Its very basic but you can download the game look at screenshots, comment etc etc..

by clicking here you can have a look

The Mystery of the Sacred Grove

Kobe Design University Presentation

2009-03-18T07:07:00.000-07:00

Here are a couple of videos from my masters research presentation.

Brain State University

2009-02-24T21:44:00.000-08:00

Game Characters

2009-02-22T00:14:00.000-08:00

Some more shots of the game characters in my game.

Female model

2008-11-09T09:05:00.000-08:00

After a friendly nudge, I am eventually writing another post. This is another model I am working on at the moment. I really have to up my output. too much time spent writing reports and pulling my hair out over kanji, bowing,wearing suits and rushing! Lifes too short, I should be drawing. :(

Head

2008-09-05T05:04:00.001-07:00

Finally back at my desk, after a couple of months of freelance and a few days travel. Feels good. When the projects I was involved in come out I might post them, until them stumm.

Kyusyu Bike touring

2008-08-17T04:15:00.001-07:00

Well Im back from the touring and it was an interesting and eventful few days.
I went to the southern island of Kyusyu by overnight ferry.
We visited the amanoiwa and got to see some of the traditional Shinto dancing,
called Kagura, I will be able to use the photos and video footage I took for
reference in my study.　Kyusyu has a much smaller population and some real natural areas,
so we got to see plenty of deer and other wild animal.
We also drove around the rim of a massive extinct volcano and got up at sunrise
to see the "sea of fog" that enshrouds the mountains, and you so often see
on ink painted hanging scrolls. We also saw Sulphur vents, and in the
Hostel we stayed there was a rooftop hot spa with the sulphur water
that is great for the skin apparently.
On the way back we were soaked in torrential rain which forced us to take shelter in a service
station, which then got hit by lightning. But other than startling people, it had no effect.
so we continued to drink coffee. I wish it could have a least destroyed the muzak system in
the place but no such luck. However we returned safely to kobe, and I am sifting through
the many photos I　took.
I also made my own saddle bags for the bike, by buying two cheap cloth suitcases and making
connecting straps and sewing it all together, for less than half the price of
the real thing, and you could hardly tell the difference, and best of all it stayed nicely attached
on the highway.Sewing-tastic!

Take care
David

Still here

2008-07-07T05:01:00.000-07:00

Well there hasnt been anything from me for a while. I've been busy payin' ma dues. I'm not sure what my image of the masters course was before I entered it, but I though at least I would have more time to concentrate on my own research. Still up till now it has been a very stimulating and broadening experiece. I've visited historical world heritage sites, took part in the Ando Tadao Youth symposium and many other interesting experiences. But now after racking up enough credit, and with about 6 months to go I am settling down to work full time on my ideas, and start applying for work too of course.
So its still busy busy busy. Heres a couple of sketches of characters I intend to make for my project.

cartoonyish model

2008-02-12T08:33:00.000-08:00

current model

2008-01-26T04:56:00.000-08:00

this is what Im working on at the moment.

A quick Pierrot

2007-10-20T02:30:00.000-07:00

A quick sketch, for design, the coloured blotches are dye moved by the power of IONs.
Ooooooh yes please contain your excitment!
We had to use the ion powered coloured sheets to make some artwork. here is my shoddy contribution.

Katana, Banana ,fofana

2007-10-03T03:49:00.000-07:00

Here is me grinning like an idiot with a Geniune Japanese Katana. It belongs to My friend Ryuos family. They discovered it when they were replacing a thatched roof on the family home, which means it is probably at least 150 years old. In the edo period the class of samurai was abolished and with it the right to bear Arms, all the weapons were meant to be handed up.... but some people stuck them in the thatch roof instead. ... OOh i think I will be hanging on to that.....
It could possibly be older, but its hard to know. and here is a photo of myself Ryuo Takashi and Takashis wife. We went out for a pint last month on my 30th birthday. Jaysus Im old.

Kobe city bus Design

2007-09-26T18:38:00.000-07:00

Hello everyone, its been a while... Here is a little clip of a 3d Bus model. It was a presentation for Kobe city council. My design will be put on 4 buses it is a special bus service to promote Environmentally friendly bus usage.(I didnt make the name) which means Kobe Environmentally Sustainable Transport.

space rabbits

2007-09-22T08:13:00.000-07:00

I havent updated in a long time.
Working on 2 projects due this week, very busy.
1. an illustration that will be printed on 4 buses in Kobe.
2.A collaborative animation with the colleges second years..I am contributing
a character model.

Nixer

2007-08-24T04:38:00.001-07:00

Here is another W.I.P It is a replica of One of the models of bus used in Kobe. Its a bit of a nixer. Who would have thought buses had so many complex moulded surfaces! They just look like boxes. Well to model something you really get to know it. I will be noticing buses a lot more from now on.

more flying rabbits

2007-08-22T23:16:00.000-07:00

as part of this group project, another character was needed. the old teacher, so Im contributing a model too. Im making it in Softimage and occasionally switching to zbrush to smooth and finish. I love the new zbrush, its great. Still wip. Im planning to use syflex cloth simulations for the clothes, and maybe the beard.

Shirakawago Project

2007-08-12T08:44:00.000-07:00

I'm just back from Shirakawago world heritage site in Japan. As part of the University internation project we teamed up with student from Pusan university (korea) and Beijing Univeristy. Together we documented various different parts of the Traditional lifestyle and architecture that still exists in the shirakawawgo valley. It was a very beautiful place. But I cant help feel it has suffered its own popularity, thousands upon thousands of tourists international and domestic come each year. But I think they still mananage to hold onto their own authentic way of life. The villagers that I did talk with still were living as they wanted to and not the poor depresed alcoholic wretches I met in The aran islands in Ireland, which has a very similar situation. here is a couple of snaps, the area is particularly famous for the massive thatched rooves that have to with stand many tonnes of snow in the winter.

TREXWIP

2007-08-03T20:30:00.000-07:00

tiny clip of the Trex wip. still no textures, just normal map and displacement.

www.davidmcdermott.org

2007-07-30T21:07:00.000-07:00

I Just put up an astounding simple page at
www.davidmcdermott.org
Its pretty much the same stuff as here. I just had to
put something up. The disgrace of having the URL
for so long and not doing anyting with it became too much.

Its Been ages!

2007-07-27T05:40:00.000-07:00

Hello Its Been bloody ages since I put anything up. Its all been dramas. Ive finished most of my english teaching now. so it is great to have more free time. But what do I do. as soon as I have any free time I get about the worst flu Ive ever had In my life. Heres me shaking and sweating on the floor of my 6 tatami mat room. God knows if it had been really bad I would have a hell of a time trying to communicate with my Korean room mate in my Faulty-towers-Manuel-esque Japanese. But luckily it went.... after about a week. then Ive been writing Two papers in Japanese one already submitted and the other due on monday, so shamefully no new art work. Instead of that. heres the full trex model from zbrush. I wasted at least a week trying to get the texturing in Zbrush working. The modeling is fantastic but the texturing is a confusing wierd buggy piece of shite. I just hope it will be sorted in the coming update. Anyhow to work around the shitty no-normal maps and texture bugs. I imported the several million poly model to XSI and between crashes I am using ultimapper to try and generate maps, occlusion /bump/displacement for the low poly model in XSI. so I will be wasting my time on that.
when I finish this paper on "the effects of traditional culture on modern Irish design."
How the hell would I know I havent lived there for 8 Years.
Dear Jesus please send me a workflow. Amen.

TrexWIP

2007-07-03T04:24:00.000-07:00

Trex Work in Progress. This is my first try at Zbrush. It is really fantastic. Need more ram.

blobs animation

2007-07-01T19:45:00.000-07:00

it worked!

Blobs animation

2007-07-01T18:38:00.000-07:00

This is a short animation the purpose was to figure out the animation controls in Xsi. It was great to get back into the animation its been such a long time! Its not gonna win any oscars but it moves!! I like the xsi system Im still getting used to it but generally very nice. Perhaps I still prefer mayas animation but it is way better than max. Ive just started working with zbrush too. Its great! hopefully my next post I will have some zbrush stuff.

EEK!

2007-06-25T02:22:00.000-07:00

Today I was rather disturbed to discover that people might actually be reading this blog. So i suppose I should put something up. This is a head of a character I made in sculpey still in progress . Im going
to make a computer version in XSI after I finish it. A bit ironically I just started using Zbrush3. I feel like I did years ago when I bought an airbrush and couple of months later tried Photoshop for the first time. Still its all good fun.

The other man in Japan

2007-06-12T18:01:00.000-07:00

I recently had the pleasure of going on a bike trip, with my friend Ryuo (his name is means flowing dragon! cool eh) to Izumo. The province of the Gods. I went to visit izumo taisha

http://www.jnto.go.jp/eng/location/regional/shimane/izumotaisha.html

It was a really amazing experience, it is one of the most important and old shrines in Japan and definitely had a very special atmosphere.

I also visited the house of Koizumi yakumo, or Lafcadio Hearn as he is known to western world.
A very interesting man. Born in greece to a greek mother and Irish father, grew up in dublin and
emigrated to america stopped off in the west indies and eventually settled In Matsue in Japan.
He translated traditional japanese stories and wrote his own in both japanese and English.

you can read his books here for free
http://www.gutenberg.org/browse/authors/h#a368

his writing is very enjoyable and I am repeatedly shocked at how I had the very same thoughts upon my first impressions of japan. But he was having them 150 years ago.

FLying Rabbits!

2007-06-01T17:01:00.000-07:00

Heres a couple of little rough sketches. They are suggestions for flight controls for flying rabbits. Yes thats right flying rabbits. Its part of a group project.

TENSEGRITY

2007-05-26T03:37:00.000-07:00

Hello Everybody,
Heres the latest report from kobe. Today in the design class we built a tensile structure.
We had a very interesting visiting lecturer, Caspar Schwabe.
We talked about the quialities and rules of constructing a tensile structure, and then we
we attempted to construct our own models.There was plenty of talk about Buckminster fuller, we even heard a recording of him singing a song, "roam home to a dome"
But the model building was more tricky than we thought.
Then after that it was outside to try and construct the full size version.
I was apprehensive......
But It all turned out in the end. (i know christian would love this)

Long lost blog is back

2007-05-21T20:24:00.000-07:00

DAMN! I just typed a really long post and aciddentally closed it.
Well here a short version.
1.Lost blog because Im not smart enough to use a computer
2.With help of a nice person called Danish I have it back.
3.I am now a masters student of Kobe design university
4.Teachers are top class http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Yoshikazu_Yasuhiko
5. My drawings suck gotta work harder, here is a "show and shame" to motivate me.

too busy to type

2006-12-10T06:52:00.000-08:00

Did the the Japanese Language Proficiency test. It was alright, ashamed of myself for not pushing myself harder. Oh well its over now. heres the wings christmas card. Quick hack job....

WOnderful

2006-11-04T06:18:00.000-08:00

I just played a very enchanting little adventure game.
http://analogik.com/multimedia_samorost.asp
it reminded me of the clangers, or the moomins.
charming. Its only short, and its very simple but
full of character.

Moving and Dramas

2006-11-03T19:09:00.000-08:00

Well the move is done and I am mostly settled in the new apartment. Its nice not to have a psychotic yakuza neighbour Shouting at his thugs at all hours of the day.
We had a bit of a drama in the bar, drunken beligerant customers. But it didnt come to blows.
Thankfully, on a happier The school had an outing. We all went hiking near nishinomia. It was a beautiful walk along a disused rail line. We had to walk through several old tunnels, some quite long. we couldnt see light from either end of the tunnel. Lucky we brought the torches.

Moving house, and HORUMON!

2006-10-29T15:41:00.000-08:00

Everything is in disarray and turmoil. I'm moving house as it happens, just down the road.
The main reason being our neighbour is a psycho Yakuza boss. He occasionally likes to
blare Enka(japanese trad) music at 4 AM so nobody can hear his business conversations.
but we can still hear him anyway. Doing his dodgy business dealings.
I will be glad to be away from him. Well at least I can say that I am having a true japanese
cultural experience, warts and all.
I found out I own lots of heavy things.
Damn.
Today I also had another new japanese experince. Horumon.
Basically horumon is cooking chicken meat on a large stone.
But... you wont find any parts of the chicken you recognise. I had
neck, heart , ovaries , intestines and stomach. It was suprisingly tasty.
Neck was a bit tough, but hearts were lovely and soft.
-David

Moving House!

2006-10-29T08:31:00.000-08:00

Packing like hell, I have a lot more crap than I thought!

Dredd Drawing

2006-10-15T05:16:00.000-07:00

Heres a little dredd sketch I did just for a laugh, I did it a while ago. Its a bit hard to look at all the problems with it now, but Im putting it up in the hope it will get me into motion and get to producing stuff. Now that I've found all these inspiring artists showing their work. I want to throw in my pathethic contribution.

Takayama Festival

2006-10-13T08:05:00.000-07:00

Ive just come back from the Japan alps. I visited Takayama for the Autumn festival. I think Takayama must be my favourite place in Japan. The city centre Is all beautiful old wooden buildings. High up in the mountains the weather was already quite cool. The last time I visited was 3 years before. (Jaysus!!) I stayed in the same Monastery with the Buddhist monks, but this time I could talk to them. But they were pretty busy. Shame:p

Tezuka Osamu

2006-10-13T07:49:00.000-07:00

I visited the Tezuka Osamu museum in Takarazuka. If you dont know who he is have a look at this,
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Osamu_Tezuka
Probably one of the most talented artist/writers that ever lived. It was fantastic to see his work first hand. Actually seeing how he inked his pages and where he whited out. Beautiful line quality.
Its inspiring and spirit crushing at the same time. When you see something that good, you see how shite you are. I'll still stick with it, shite as I am. Heres a statue that was outside.

2006-10-07T10:40:00.000-07:00

I found another fantastic blog with character designs and art from lots of Disney artists.
http://armand-serrano-interview.blogspot.com/
heres an interview
and heres the site
http://characterdesign.blogspot.com/

2006-10-06T09:07:00.000-07:00

And another one this is the street im living on.

2006-10-06T08:34:00.000-07:00

Heres a photo I took in town today. The seasons change quite suddenly here, already the heat of summer is gone and now the cool breezes and drizzle is with us. I feel at home, its just like back home.
Im working away on the wings website at the moment but not finished yet. I will post as soon as it is.

The thief and the cobbler

2006-10-03T21:04:00.000-07:00

I just found this site, this guy has taken all the released versions of the Thief and the cobbler and tried to edit them together to match as closely as possible the workprint shich was the intended form of the film.
Classic.
he's even made a cover for the dvd
http://www.orangecow.org/thief/cobbleramarayv3.jpg

and put it on youtube as well as on bit torrent.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=V2czfar4Zg4

and a christmas carol too
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=LRj7nt05UTI

Happy B-Day

2006-10-03T20:50:00.000-07:00

Forgot to say,its my older brothers birthday, Happy Birthday LEO!

Belated Posting

2006-10-03T20:43:00.000-07:00

Well I really didnt take to the blogging at all did I? Two posts and I gave up. Well there has been a bit of news in between. I've been accepted to a masters course in CG animation in Kobe Design university. I am really deighted, of course it will all be in Japanese, SO I really have to start working my ass off to get my japanese up to speed before enrolement. But it really is a fantastic opportunity. The professors list is like the credits for a ghibli film, with many prominent designers illustrators. Im over the moon.
SO what am I doing. Basically I want to use the opportunity to make a game demo and a nice short film and then use this to try and get further funding for my game project idea. Wish me luck.
-David

2006-04-16T05:01:00.000-07:00

Hello everyone, Well here we are. I'm pretty busy at the moment. I'm working as abartender or
Baa-ten-Da as they say in Japan. Here is the site....
http://www.ryansirishpub.com/eng/index.htm

It's good fun. We have an interesting mix of Japanese and Foreigners, and they all have a story to tell. Here is a photo of some of the regulars just after doing their tea ceremony.

The Boss of the bar Alan Ryan is off Running the marathon de sable at the moment.
He has a site www.craicpot.com
Actually he has just succesfully completed it. Fair Balls to you Alan!!

Life in Kobe

2006-04-14T20:21:00.000-07:00

Well I've finally decided to do it. Here is my blog. 28 year old Irishman in Kobe.
Trying to learn japanese. I want to give a little taste of what life is like in Japan.
hope fully I can add a few photos, too.
Thats all for now from your man in Japan-David