Tell us a little bit about yourself...

I’m 20 years old. Born and grew up in Malaysia before I came to Australia about 3 months ago. At the moment I’m doing my bachelor of arts in multimedia. So nothing but assignments, assignments and assignments, and occasionally some sleep.

When did you first develop an interest in vector illustration?

Right about when I just started learning Photoshop. I stumbled upon really beautiful illustrations on the web and just thought that I had to do that someday. So I tried doing it and soon developed an interest for it.

Have you had any formal training or are you self-taught?

I’m completely self-taught.

Where do you currently live and work?

I’m residing in Melbourne. I’m currently jobless.

How do you feel your surroundings influence your work?

Occasionally my surrounding cultures influence my work.

What kind of work environment do you have?

My room is my working environment. It’s the perfect place to work with all the right equipments around me, if only I could get the monitor in a better position.

Do you work straight onto computer or do you sketch your ideas out first?

I work straight onto the computer because most of the time I’m too lazy to sketch my ideas on a piece of paper. However, I do plan and sketch ideas for bigger projects like CD-ROMs and animation.

Describe your style:

Smooth and sexy.

How did it develop?

When I started learning about vector art, most of the illustrations I saw were flat and had thick outlines. After much practice and trials, the style slowly developed as I progressed with a new piece- each one looking better than the previous one. I’m still working on developing my own unique style. 

What do you personally get out of your art?

The satisfaction upon completing my work gives me a nice and happy feeling – and also something to add to my portfolio.

What inspires you to create?

The inspirations I get are mostly from other works by other artists and music. Sometimes I look back at some of my old works; they just make me want to improve myself and to create something better.

My inspiration may come from anything. Most of them are from things that I see everyday, events that took place around me or other people. I get inspirations from the things that I fancy or come across with, such as animations and illustrations. There is also this feeling that I get, the urge to create. So much so that my fingers get itchy and the next thing that I must do is to fire up Illustrator and start doodling.

What is the most rewarding aspect of what you do? The most frustrating?

I guess for every artist or designer, seeing your own final product is the most rewarding aspect of it all. Well, at least for me. It’s always good to see your work getting the respect that it deserves after all the hard work and effort you put into it.

The most frustrating? Definitely having my work ripped off by someone. Also, it’s very frustrating at times when you just can’t get your creative juices flowing.

Do you enjoy discussion of your work or would you prefer it to be left as a purely visual experience?

There isn’t any story or concept behind most of my works. So, I would really prefer my work to be left there as a visual experience.

When someone looks at your work, what would you like them to get from it?

I hope that that person would get inspired. I want to be an influence to other artists as well. It’s a nice feeling to have your work accepted by people and knowing that they acknowledge you for your effort and passion. It makes you feel like you’re on top of the world!

What inspires the themes in your work?

Nothing really inspires the themes in my work. I just choose a particular subject matter that I’m interested in and illustrate it. Most of my vector works that I do are short practices of my technical side. But right now I’m more into abstract art and just trying out some new stuff rather than the old boring works that I usually do.

Your work has a certain comic style quality. Do you have any favourite titles/characters?

I don’t have any favourite comic titles or characters. I think that my style has a certain influence from contemporary character designs and simple vector illustrations. Then it slowly evolved as time goes by, as I try new things and methods.

You do a lot of portraits, what response do you get from your subjects when they see how you have depicted them?

They usually like what they see, which is good because you know you did well. People often request me to do a portrait of them. I do occasionally do a requested portrait but being such a busy person, I haven’t really completed any of them till today. Only one time I manage to complete a vector portrait of a person which took me way too long. But at the end, it felt good and it was worth the time.

Over at deviantart.com, you are a ‘deviant of many talents’. What are your other passions/interests?

Well, I’m also interested in interactive, motion graphics and music. I never submit my other works on deviantart.com. Maybe I should…hmm…

Do you have any new projects coming up that you can tell us about?

Apart from assignments, there isn’t really much I can do in my spare time besides catching up on my sleep. I’m also hoping to start producing my own short animation but I doubt that would be anytime in the near future.

What do you hope to achieve in the near future?

Develop more in my style. Get my work out there. Start my own design studio. Become famous and rich. Have a tricycle tour around the city.

Any words of advice for those pursuing their creative goals:

I’m not good at giving advices but one thing I’m sure of is that the most important shortcut key on the keyboard is Ctrl + S.
Always save your work, kids.