About Me:
ie: How I ended up making a Graphic Novel for my Graduation Project
Hi, I am Rei [he/they], a Queer artist in SG
In 2024, I graduated with a Double Major in Art History and English Literature from Nanyang Technological University in Singapore.
Technically, I was supposed to write a 10k-word research essay for each of my Major's graduation projects (research and academic writing is my specialisation). Instead- I made a Graphic Novel for my Art History Major, despite never having done anything like that in my entire life :) I just found that academic writing was not as accessible and as sensitive as hand-drawn images, so when it came to discussing local history- the graphic novel format was the only way forward for me.
What followed was an incredible year-long process of teaching myself how to draw and make comics, learning digital art software from scratch, along with conducting several interviews for the first time and researching the lost histories of Singapore.
I am currently pursuing a career in freelance illustrating and working on publishing my own comics.
2022
AUGUST - DECEMBER
Starting From Scratch
I had always drawn for fun, but I was never really that good at drawing things from imagination. Starting out was really rough. I had very little idea what I was doing with no knowledge of anatomy or perspective. I fumbled along blindly for a few months, studying anatomy from the book, but not yet grasping form or 3D space. I attended live drawing sessions for the first time at NTU's ADM school and learned quickly that I had a long road ahead of me.
2023
JANUARY
Draft after Draft after Draft after Draft...
Drawing is hard. Planning comics is really hard too. Up to this period, alongside studying to improve my drawing technically, I was trying to grasp things like story boarding, pacing and composition which I had never thought about before. Multiple comic drafts were rejected, and I was on a insane deadline to prove I could make this project work in a year, along with my second FYP for my other major in Literature. After all that, I still had no idea what it would even look like. Yikes.
2023
JUNE
Small Victories
Having somewhat grasped anatomy at this point, my drawings improved significantly. I started experimenting with cell shading and colours digitally. I still had an issue with proportions, but had began to set my sights on understanding forms and shapes in space, as well as tackling perspective while drawing . I realised I had a hard time placing "feet on the floor" so to speak- so it was time to draw boxes in space, over and over and over. Fundamentals were important to me, and I wanted to get it right this time!
2023
OCTOBER
Some Technical Breakthroughs
I had been attending the live drawing sessions weekly at ADM for about a year now, and I could now easily see things in perspective. I had fixed most of my proportion issues with the rigor and motivation to improve my drawing every week for each session. I could draw much faster, and I became more confident in my line work. I benefited greatly from the camaraderie and shared critique that came with sharing a room with fellow artists during those sessions- drawing with others made the experience electrifying!
2024
FEBRUARY
Finally Starting the Work
A year and a half into starting my art journey and reading a lot more graphic novels and comics, I started planning panels for the work that actually made sense and that I was somewhat satisfied with. It was the end of the year, and I had only another 3 months to pull the comic together along with my other graduation project. Thankfully, all the pieces fell together somehow- and the whole year of preparation, trial and error and experimentation had come together in the form of a scrapbook format- a perfect way to showcase the fragments of history gathered through this project. My style changed drastically between several periods of my artistic experimentation and growth in the 30 pages that make up the novel so far- a fact that I have embraced as showing what a rewarding learning experience this has been, and can continue to be.
2024
PRESENT
Post-Graduation and Looking Forward
Having submitted my 2 FYPs in April 2024, my desire to continue pursuing a creative art career was solidified. I have continued to work on my draftsmanship and style, as well as further familiarise myself with the digital mediums (ie photoshop, indesign...) that had carried me through this project. Recently, I've started looking more into colouring and painting digitally as a way to further expand my technical abilites, and continue to post the results on my Instagram page @f0reignB0dy.