New Character: NPC

This is a minor non-playable character from the video game Chinese Paladin 5.

watercolour

The robe he is wearing is known as shenyi (lit. deep garment;深衣). This hanfu style is more than 3000 years old, and is a formal wear.
Generally there are two types of shenyi: zhi-ju (lit. vertical-wrapping front;直裾) and qu-ju (lit. diagonal-wrapping front；曲裾).  The one shown here is the former, because the front piece of the garment is straight and flat.

Zhiju-shenyhi might look similar to a Japanese kimono. However, they are very different in terms of making and wearing (this is a bit complicated, I might explain it in more details in the future).

Different parts of zhiju-shenyi. Retrieved from Wikipedia <http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Han_Chinese_clothing>

Headwear

New Character: NPC with a Fan

This is a minor non-playable character from the video game Gujianqitan. This painting is closely based on the original design of the  character.

watercolor, white gouache

In this painting, she is also wearing the qixiong-ruqun (chest-level skirt with a short garment). The outer skirt is slightly shorter than the under skirt, and it allows the latter layer to show through. This design is commonly used in the making of some modern hanfu.

A similar qixiong-ruqun from an ancient painting by Zhoufang

The hairstyle is called luo-ji （literal meaning：shell-like bun; 螺髻), because its shape resembles a seashell.

From an unknown book about ancient Chinese hairstyle

Hybrid Media Exercise: Two Important Terms

Note: this blog entry was supposed to be posted during the researching phase of the project. Because I had absolutely no clue what to do at the time, and I needed to connect these terms to the actual work (which was very open-ended), I decided to post them when the video was done.


Immersion (immersive virtual reality):

Immersion is a mental state in which the participants are unaware of their body or physical self, as if they are lost within another environment which is often artificial. Immersion is an important aspect of many artistic installations and video games. For example, when they are playing video games, the players are often lost in the virtual reality, and become unaware of their physical surroundings and time. In fact, some of the game developers are aiming for this effect, such as by using the first-person viewing angle in the games (one good example will be a recently released game called "Dear Esther").

Retrieved from IGN <http://www.ign.com/images/games/dear-esther-pc-100307/3589955>

In addition, immersion was one of the essential objective of my work "Flow." In my personal case, I tired to create an immersive atmosphere by juxtaposing highly contrasting visual and audio elements.


Haptic Visuality

In short, haptic visuality is the touch of eyes. For example, in a tactile blind contour drawing exercise, the artist is drawing down the objects without looking at the actual drawing, as he/she is trying to touch and feel the contour of the objects with his/her eyes, and then he/she translate this sensory information onto the paper. Moreover, during such exercises, any optical illusory information such as tonal shadow is omitted, because it is not attained by the sense of touching.

The reason I put this term  here is because haptic visuality is originally part of my work. I was going to incorporate parts of the blind contour drawings in the video, and thus it will adds to the hybridity of the work. However, due to the fact that the video was already quiet long, I decided to leave certain things out.

Finally Done!!!

NOTE: the following work was made for a discussion forum. I thought it would be fun to share it here since the blog was a sketchbook. Moreover, it was completed recently.

I started this watercolor painting last August, but then I procrastinated for nearly half a year, probably because I got scared and had a lot of homework during last Fall. Finally, I finished it last weekend.

This painting is part of the Traditional Clothing and Fan Art series. The clothing she wears here is a hanfu style known as qixiong-ruqun. She also wears a jacket-like garment on the outside, with a long sash which serves as decoration.

• Qixiong means being at the chest-level, because the long skirt is tied above the chest-line. 
• Ru-qun means, respectively, the upper garment and the skirt. It is a general term used to describe such combination.

This particular style had been popular in the Late Tang Dynasty, also known as Five Dynasties and Ten Kingdom Period.
Today, similar outfits have been used in some traditional Han Chinese weddings (as parts of the revival movement, of course).

Reference 1: mural painting from  Mogao Cave in Dunhuang

Reference 2: hairstyle

Note: I have replaced the original picture with one that has a better quality. It appears to be a bit greenish on Mac.
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Character based on video game Gujianqitan
Watercolor, acrylic, gouache