Thursday, May 7, 2009

Takoyaki and More!

Doesn't that just looks delish? Takoyaki, fried battered balls filled with octopus pieces covered with takoyaki sauce, mayonnaise, seaweed and bonito flakes, is one of my favourite Japanese snacks. I don't remember when I heard about this, but it may have been from the short animated omake from the second Cardcaptor Sakura movie, featuring Kero-chan.

For the Vancouverites; this one is from the food court in Aberdeen Centre in Richmond, BC (I forgot the name of the stall), but you can find it in other special events like the Night Market or the Powell Street Festival.

Anyway, what's the point of me tempting you with food? Oh it's kinda related to the latest comic...

The Melancholy of Saber Lily Part 14

So Saber Lion was right... it was food after all!

I was overestimating this part and my skills in creating the extra "panel" for this comic. I thought I had pretty good skills in editing movies, but the program I was using (Windows Movie Maker) was kinda basic, and I feel like I'm running out of time... So I just spliced it together to make it on time. Plus I don't think I can do it any better than this. If I think I can then I will work on it again another time :P So here it is...


And now for the boring behind-the-scenes segment of this post...

The above picture was for part 13 and 14 of my comics. That's why you still see the Nendoroid Miku in this picture. Now, you might be wondering why I have Louise in there too. I did get her recently and noticed she had a pained, crying face. Very cute! So I used that in part 13 for Miku where she's getting hit by Saber Lion. I had to recolour the eyebrows because it was pink, matching Louise's hair. No one took a guess though ^^;

Rin was also used, for her face only, lol. Unfortunately her face doesn't fit properly in Saber Lion, but heck it works fine as you can see above. The face stickers were useful too, but I actually scanned them rather than actually sticking them. I always have this thing about hating to use stickers because they'd be a waste when I want to stick them on to something else... Damn my conservative style!

Lastly this is Saber Lion using Rin's blank face carrying a pan. I used the blank face to make Saber Lion smile, just like Chiyo-chan in the original cooking song animation... I was going to use the scanned stickers for this face, but it didn't have the appropriate eyes. Instead I cut out the eyes from Saber Lion's angry face, added "happy" eyebrows and used a smiling sticker for the video. I had to buy the pan she's holding from this miniature food items series. It was a stupid purchase. I figured I could've just taken a picture of a frying pan and do it in Photoshop... *sigh* Since I was getting lazy at this point, wanting to finish this quickly, I just stick the pan on her hand with masking tape.

Anyway... I'll end it with the source of my silly idea of a video... Enjoy!

23 comments:

  1. That Nendoroid Louise is soo cute!! ^^ wish I can order that..but I'm out of money right now haha... nice EPIC conclusion of "The Melancholy of Saber Lily!!" haha

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  2. I guess that a Re-Ment pan?
    Im getting the Re-ment Kotatsu Set for more shenanigans (or however its called) in the future.

    Lion Saber has quite some appetite.She even gobbels down nasty Tentacles that were in her onee-sama a few seconds ago ^^

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  3. Nice 4koma and Saber cooking video ^^. I should really pick up the Rin and Len nendos one of these days, those faces look pretty handy. Did you scan the stickers and reprint on sticker paper then? I wanted to get the Louise nendoroid but they had to release it almost around the same time as the goth punk PVC that I fell in love with. Did you get the backdrop thing with your Louise?

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  4. @Argyle: Ah yeah, I'm short on actual cash, too, but I HAVE to have my Louise after finding out that it's not an exclusive :D For now it's just concluding the tentacle saga, but I hope to make more Saber Lily comics ^_^

    @Blowfish: Whoa! Good eye! Yes, it is a Re-Ment pan. LoL the way you put "that were in her onee-sama a few seconds ago" just made me lol XD

    @Persocom: Yeah the blank faces are good potential for anything you want. I believe Rin and Len are on sale at HLJ.com. I actually just scanned it and just copy and pasted it in Photoshop. Same with the backdrop, I just made a gradient and used a cloud filter for it ^^

    And am I the only one who didn't get that Goth Punk Louise?? >_<

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  5. I see that there is a lot of work gone into the 4koma as well. Thanks for the funny stories!

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  6. @Wolfheinrich: Thanks for always reading & commenting! LoL sorry if there was any misconceptions... this won't be the last one, I have a full explanation at DC.com

    But it is quite a time consuming project for each chapter. I could spend half a day/12 hours compiling everything, from shooting to editing and extra stuff I'm going to add. Not to mention writing up the blog post about it. Oh and I do get distracted in between, so that slows me down too ^^;

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  7. Saber Lion is my new favourite character.

    Now if only she added, "Gai Gar!" at the end of her battlecry in the second panel....

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  8. @lightning Can't wait for more ^^

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  9. First time I see Saber Lion with a pan...

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  10. @Snark: Haw! I'll see what I can do next time :P

    @Argyle: Hopefully it won't be too long of a wait ^^;

    @phossil: LoL, unfortunately it doesn't fit in her hand, thus why it's only taped on her hand XD

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  11. ORZ, Saber lions Insanity lvls gone max, high enough to think tentacle monsters makes good takoyaki^^;

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  12. saber lion goes berserk whenever i have to step into the confines of Aberdeen Parking lot

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  13. Mmmmm Takoyaki sooo yummy. Me wants after looking at your photo ^^;;

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  14. @Gunstray: Haha yeah, that's exactly what I was going for XD

    @lyfeprojekt: LOL! *I* go berserk for takoyaki whenever I'm in the Aberdeen Centre parking lot! I even waited for half an hour for fresh takoyaki once!

    @Anthony & Saku: It's too good to pass up, hope you can have some soon :D

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  15. Ahhhh the takoyaki is making me so hungry. I miss Vancouver >< There's not enough good Japanese places here in Toronto.

    CCS is also making me nostalgic...

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  16. @Micchi: I'm surprised there aren't as many good Japanese restaurants in Toronto. It's a bigger city, isn't it?

    CCS is still one of my favourites. ^_^

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  17. Yummy Takoyaki. I remember having them when I "sweep street" (in chinese...if you're chinese...I think you're chinese...sorry if you're not. ^^;;) in Mong Kok. Damnit...makes me want to go back to HK just to eat all those food along the streets.

    Nice 4koma...didn't know Lion Saber will eat anything. At least Saber Lily had "fun" before her octopus got snacked by Lion Saber. ^^;;

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  18. @T.I.P.: Close, I am Asian, and of Chinese descent, but don't speak a lick of Chinese XD I always get people walking up to me and talk in Chinese and I always say sorry ^^; Takoyaki seems to be catching on around here, but not too common yet.

    LoL this idea of me turning the tentacle into takoyaki has been in my head for the longest time when I first introduced it. It was inevitability XD

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  19. @Lightningsaber LOL, I'm Chinese, and I speak Chinese...but I still say "sorry" when they walk up to me and start asking me questions in Mandarin... ^^;;;;

    I've had people walk up to me and ask questions in Japanese, and Korean as well...they just assumed I spoke their language. ^^;

    And sorry...I should've read your profile. ^^;; Don't know why, but I've always assumed your Chinese for some reason. Probably because I'm Chinese. ^^;;;

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  20. @T.I.P.: Haha yeah, too many different Chinese language too. I'd like to see some stranger come up to me and actually ask me something in Indonesian XD

    No worries about it. I do have the Chinese look after all. Though I don't really show my face too much around here or DC.com, eh? Well except for that one picture...

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  21. I completely understand about not wanting to use stickers. I have a box of stickers still on their original sheets from my childhood XD

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  22. @Coco: LoL someone who knows how I feel. Stickers are meant to be kept in its sheet! Not to be stuck on something XD

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