I’m very proud to share with you my talented husband‘s latest animated creation – a music video for the Rock Ed collaboration song “Kaninong Anino” (lyrics by Gang Badoy-Capati, music by Francis de Veyra, performed by Aia de Leon, Noel Cabangon, Vin Dancel, Kris Dancel, Ebe Dancel, Lourd de Veyra, Gloc-9, Raimund Marasigan, and many other musicians).

The song is part of Rock Ed Philippines’ ROCK RIZAL album which celebrates our National Hero’s 150th birth anniversary. The video shows Rizal walking around a post apocalyptic Manila – a metaphor Arn used to symbolically represent the rampant corruption in our society. I have to admit that seeing the video for the first time moved me and made me put myself in Rizal’s shoes. What would he think, seeing the Philippines as it is now? Did he die for us in vain?

From Arnold:

I knew it would be a mistake to try and interpret the lyrics literally so I put a lot of symbolism in the video. We see the structures of Manila all destroyed — however the monuments are still standing. It’s my way of saying that with all the corruption, our country has deteriorated and because of consumerism, we seem to have forgotten our heroes and what they fought for. However their images are still intact and that’s one thing that should encourage us to go on.

You can read the rest of the “making of” notes on his blog.

Arn actually finished this in less than two weeks in between working on pages for a comic collaboration project with a friend (that I believe I can’t announce yet). I’m amazed at how quickly he’s learning the ropes in animation and no words can express how happy I am that he’s found a new medium for his stories. 🙂

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Apologies for showing up only when I have something to promote (gosh I’ve become a hardcore internet marketer) but a lot has been going on behind the scenes. Renovations on our home, for one.  I also just realized that I wasn’t able to blog about our talk in Graphika Manila last year! It was an exhilarating experience for Arn and me and I have to publicly thank Aram Beheshti and company for being so patient with us. The truth is that he’s invited us to speak for years but it was only in 2010 that we (rather, I) had the guts to say yes. As I posted on Facebook last year, I’m deathly afraid of public speaking so I was glad to get it over with. Thankfully the feedback on our portion was surprisingly good so that’s a relief. 🙂

You can view the intro video we presented which features our combined design work below.

Graphika Manila 2010 Intro Video / Arnold &… by arnoldarre

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I also purposely haven’t been taking on local projects and have avoided loitering around my usual social networking haunts for the last 12+ months because I want to enjoy my last year as a 30-something at my own pace. (There, I said it!) That’s not to say that I’ve stopped designing. In fact I was busy all year (secretly) blogging for my niches elsewhere and fixing and filling up all my online stores with merch, including these cute items for one of my latest ventures Funky Patterns.

Some of my designs are actually available on stationery locally via Paperio which has a store at Powerplant in Rockwell. Just look for my name and a small kitty logo at the back of the items. I don’t have the physical products with me so I can’t post them here yet but I hope you can seek them out the next time you drop by the store.

Bye for now. 🙂

In an alternate reality, the Eraserheads actually released an 8th final full-length album titled Waltz This Knee containing 8 new tracks by the Philippines’ fab four. This is the album’s wraparound sleeve that I designed:

In this reality however, the revolutionary team of Uno Magazine invited me to illustrate a piece written by rock music journalist Aldus Santos about an imagined final Eraserheads album for their special April 2010 (Fiction) issue. Here’s an excerpt:

“In February of this year, I got an unmarked brown envelope that bore the label “Hubad sa Kalsada [Mix-Down 001/2007].” Inside was a CDR. Playing it back, it revealed a bare, guitar-and-voice recording bearing that unmistakable falsetto (with the voice double-tracked, and with a bit of slap-back echo, a la Spector’s Lennon recordings, as in “Instant Karma”). It sounded sort of gothic folk, but sang in falsetto. This was most unusual. Insanely enough, I sometimes get unsolicited demos over e-mail from indie bands who ask for professional advice — to which I invariably say, “I’ll be as much help to you as a sack of hammers; see if there is a listing under ‘Rico Blanco’ in the white pages” — but this can’t be one of those demos. More to the fact, it is unmarked. I personally brought this up with suspect number one, Ely Buendia, but he unnaturally shifted gears, “You know what we don’t hear a lot? Good whistlers.” Such a strange, eyeliner-wearing man.”

Read the rest of the story in Uno Mag’s April 2010 issue. It’s on a limited run and is only available until May 5, 2010 so hurry and get your copy now! Learn more about this special issue on the Uno Magazine website.

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There are plenty of projects afoot but since I’m not allowed to say anything about them yet, I will just leave you with some new illustrations I made over the past few weeks for no particular reason. If I make more and have them printed as postcards, will anyone buy them? Let me know what you think. 🙂

1. Dreamtangle 1, 2. Dreamtangle 2, 3. Pigtails, 4. Sleeping Kitty

Wow, in four days it will be a year since I last updated this blog! Where did the time go? I don’t even know what to write about here anymore. *sheepish grin*

There are actually TWO things that prompted me to post an update.

1) A conversation I had with my friend Ramon a few nights ago. He said that he and Neva have been wondering why I haven’t posted anything new in a while. Often wondering about that myself, I arrived at the conclusion that, well, unless I do a major overhaul and talk solely about how I make money online ((just see how many hits this site will get with that keyphrase plugged in!)), no one will pay attention to this entry, or even this blog. In this age of Facebook, Twitter, and Tumblr, “About Me” blogs have become passe, I figured . They are so 2001 and so is this site. *mopes*

but then…

2) Surprise! A comment came this way (why thank you Rand Al Thor) and this fact offered me some assurance that this site is still getting visitors! Triple exclamation points!!!

… (silence)

… (cricket sounds)

Aaaanyhoo ..  for the benefit of the lovely readers who still drop by every now and then (yes, all three of you LOL), I will try my best to fill you in with what I have been up to since the last time I checked in.

Eraserheads The Final Set

* Eraserheads: The Final Set. You all know that this band holds a special place in my heart so naturally, we were there for their last. ever. reunion. concert. Arn has videos of some of the performances on his Youtube.

KL Design Week 2009

* KL Design Week 2009. Arn & I flew to Kuala Lumpur, Malaysia with our good friends Carlo & Nina to stalk Stefan Sagmeister… I mean, to see, meet, and listen to some of the world’s top graphic designers talk about their thought processes and showcase their latest work. Aside from Stefan Sagmeister, other highlights for me were the presentations by Kuntzel&Deygas (the French duo behind Caperino & Peperone and the memorable Catch Me If You Can opening title sequence) and Lava Architects (the Australian firm that designed the glorious Water Cube that was launched at the 2008 Beijing Olympics, among others).

Nins and I did actually manage to corner Stefan Sagmeister and ask for a photo with him each — twice — so that’s now off the bucket list. 😉

* Volunteering for Rock Ed Philippines and designing / maintaining Rock Ed Radio‘s website. I first met the brilliant Gang Badoy in the early 90s but she flew off and lived in the US for a decade.  Armed with several masters degrees, she put up Rock Ed Philippines upon coming home in 2005. Rock Ed is a volunteer group dedicated to promote alternative education through holding classes on different areas of knowledge such as music, the arts, sports, science, and cultural studies. It has been (and still is) always a pleasure knowing that our contributions, however small, are helping make this country a better place.

* Saying goodbye to Wedding Essentials Magazine as Design Director. It was a difficult decision to make ((many tears were shed, yes)) since Editor-in-Chief and good friend Marbee and I make up the “we” in Wedding Essentials. We saw the magazine from its inception, to its birth in 2004, and through its growth into the big player that it is now (seeing how successful it is now kinda makes me feel like a proud mom). I thought it was time for me to move on since I knew the magazine would be in very able hands with Marb and Kitten at its helm anyway, although I am still with them in spirit. The issue above is the last one I worked on.

…but wait, Marbee and I have a wedding blog, We Heart Weddings. Because we really love weddings (and we really do like working with each other!)

* My Arn made a short film, his first ever. Arn has always wanted to make films, ever since he was a kid, so now that he can, he did. This is the trailer for the suspense/thriller short he made called Chapter:-0ne. We held screenings for it during the second half of last year at Fully Booked (twice) and Nomnomnom. He hopes to make another one soon, so watch out for updates on here.

* Uno Magazine named me one of their “Women on Top”. Me? Really? Aaaawwshucks *blush*. Being in a 12-page spread along with smart, innovative, trail-blazing women makes me feel that I probably am doing something right in my life.

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That’s it for now. Next time, I will give you a sneak peak of the super secret project I’m working on. (Clue: it starts with an E , ends with heads and it will come in a box) 😉