Thursday, May 22, 2008

Would You Like Some Tee?

"Silence is Golden, but Duct Tape is Shiny!"

Unknown


I was originally quite enthusiastic about participating in the college T-shirt designing competition again this year when it was first announced sometime last month. Somehow along the way, my enthusiasm got tired, sat down under a shady tree by the roadside and died in its sleep. I like having good ideas and I like to see them being realised. It's the work part in between the idea and the realisation that don't quite agree with me. In a perfect world, I'd have a doppelgänger who looks like me, thinks like me and perform whatever work I want done perfectly to my specifications and satisfaction. But hey, this world stinks - so I don't. And I had to design my own damn T-shirt.

Even though there was a month's worth of time for me to do the grunt works, I only started doing any actual designing about a couple of days before the deadline. That's just me; I simply can't do anything before the Last Minutes come banging on my door with pitchforks, torches, and a burning straw effigy of me. If you look up "procrastination" in a dictionary, you won't find a picture of me there. Dictionaries don't have pictures, moron. You'll find the definition of procrastination there, which is practically my life philosophy, my highest principle and my One True Faith. The only reason it didn't get around as much as Christianity, Buddhism and Nazism did was because we kept putting off spreading the good word about it.

On the night before the deadline, I messaged Inn Shan, his royal highness Prez of the Student Council, to tell him that I wasn't going to submit my entry - mainly because I didn't have an entry to submit. I only had a rough draft of the design of the shirt's front and... yeah, that's all I got. Rough draft. Front of shirt. I gave up bothering at about 10:00 pm and played Diablo II. Screw the contest, I said. The prize is going to be just one free shirt anyway, since any extra funds generated for the student council through the tee sale goes into paying for the annual Supremo Ball (OH MY GAWD, change the fucking name already! I keep thinking "Ultimate Testicle" every time I hear it!). I didn't even wear the one I designed and won last year because the quality, to be perfectly honest, was cow dung (no fault of the design, o' course). I went to bed a happy man feeling as if I'm some overworked pencil-pusher who hated his job for 20 years and had just found found the balls to fire his boss in a comical and violent outburst. It didn't quite pan out that way, really, between the Prez and I; but that's how it felt like. And it felt awesome.

Then in the next morning, my doorbell screamed holy murder at what felt like 7 or 8 o'clock (I am perpetually disoriented - I thought today is Tuesday and was wondering why this fucking week felt so bloody long). Oh wait, it was a knock on the door actually, not the doorbell but that's really beside the point. Anyway, I opened it and peered blearily into the glaring day outside, which actually blinded me for a good couple of seconds. Once the cottony wooziness wore out of my eyes, I saw Inn Shan standing there, looking a tad sheepish.

"Huh?" I'm simply not very eloquent in mornings.

"Your T-shirt design - where is it?" he said. I shot a look at his hand to see if he was holding a pistol.

"But it's not done..." I began but before I could give him one of my famous impromptu excuses on why I'm not getting stuff done, he cut me short.

"Just give me what you got."

Okay-lah, Inn Shan's a really mild bloke and is always polite, and he wasn't really as curt and acerbic as I've painted him here. It's a narrative thing, so let's ignore that and get back to the story.

So, I transfered said unfinished front design of my T-shirt into a thumb drive he brought with him (while simultaneously downloading some other contestant's submissions into my laptop) and sent him off with it. To be honest, I really didn't want to show anyone my unfinished work - I feel violated somehow every time I was made to do that. It's like someone seeing me without any clothes on. Not a good thing, I suppose you can imagine. Still, having the student council president coming in person to pick up my entry after the deadline is kind of... somewhat... cool.

Later that day, I found out that my design has won by popular vote.

Say what?

"Yes. U got most votes. I go find u nw," confirmed Inn Shan in an SMS.

I was stupefied. My rough draft of half a shirt beat everyone else's entries? I don't know what sort of java the student council members were downing that morning, but heck, I damn well want some. Please.

It turns out that I only beat the second and third placer by 2 and 3 votes respectively, and both of those entry were sent in by the same girl in my class, an artistic type who could already paint when I was still eating crayons. She submitted 3 or 5 entries I think, and I really like one of them,

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That's how us medical types wear our stethoscopes.

Cool right?! There's another version of this design with a weird, nude and cute cartoon guy on the bottom left wearing a and holding up a piece paper with the letters "MBBS" on it but I like this plain one better. The other designs aren't really my cup of tee at all (Oh, look look! I made a punny!).

A junior from Batch 19, Lingghezhi, turned in an entry with a concept I seriously like but I'm guessing that the people over at the jawatangilakuasa probably didn't get it. If I'm ever going to design another tee for my medical college again, I plan to adapt his theme. Heck, maybe I'll just design it, take orders and sell them on my own. Lingghezhi himself is completely open to that idea.

Okay, enough of yakking now. Here's mine, the completed official Melaka Manipal Medical College T-shirt design of year 2008. Feel free to clap hands or wolf-whistle.

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This goes in front, across the chest.

That weird 'M' right there is a stylized version of my university's logo, which my college belongs to. I actually thought this slogan up last year but I did not use it for my design then because I thought the school board would not approve. This year, I just cared less.

And this is the back, finished and polished,

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"Inspired by Life" is the dorky motto of my uni. In the first draft of this design, I wrote "Inspired by Mind-Altering Substances". "Inspired by Psychosomatic Diseases" was another one I toyed with. Sigh, I knew they wouldn't fly with the Dean - but here's to hoping, eh?

After I learnt that I have won, and I was told to produce the back of the shirt over the weekend. Of course, I jumped straight into work in that distinctive fashion I always do and toiled industriously (by going to Mangalore for a day trip to watch Prince Caspian on Saturday, and beat my way from Act I to Act III in Diablo II through Sunday). I managed to squeezed in a couple of hours in the wee hours of Monday to hatch out a sketchy design to hand in to Inn Shan.

So the one that all the class representatives showed their batches on Tuesday was like, not the definitive design, haha. Look, it's funny to me, okay.

The finalized edition (above) only existed on Tuesday night, right after a couple more hours of Diablo II (damn, this old game is freaking addictive!). I remember when I showed Inn Shan the end design of the back on Wednesday morning, he asked me why I didn't just finish it over the weekend.

"You first day know me, arh?" I answered proudly. Now there's some misplaced pride for you.

Moving on, the skeleton of the design was drawn with William Blake's
The Great Red Dragon and the Woman Clothed in Sun watercolour painting in mind and more specifically, the Red Dragon tattoo on the back of Francis Dolarhyde, the psychopathic serial killer in Thomas Harris' book. You can vaguely make out the wings, the tail, the head and one of the horns. I blunted everything to make it look heart-shaped eventually. I know I'm obsessive, and I don't need a psychiatrist either, thank you very much.

The maple leaves on top of the word "Inspired" was purely a fluke. I was testing out brushes in Photoshop - you know, idly drawing and then rubbing them off using the different brushes that came with the program just for kicks - and somehow, the random smudge I made with the maple brush just happened to turn out really nice! And I didn't even change or move or alter it in any way because I liked it so much.

Also, the maple leaves serendipitously provided me with the solution of incorporating the 'tail' of the Red Dragon without making it too obvious. I went for an organic floral design by extending the 'i' of 'Life' into a tap root, making the whole phrase appear like some growing plant, and that scored even more pseudo-symbolism points.

Oh, if you look really hard, you'll see that I've inserted a rather cute animal into it as well. I dedicate that to my girlfriend. Unfortunately, as hard as I tried, I couldn't sneak my name in somewhere. Bummersville.

Here's how the whole thing suppose to look like all printed out,

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Front.



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Back.

Blue was the original colour of the design, but Inn Shan preferred it in orange. I told him to see if he can negotiate with the printers make the shirts in both the colours at no extra charges - because some people have mentioned to me that they would rather have it in blue. Unlike last year, I might even get involved in the negotiations and printing process this time because (1) the previous shirt turned out to be something I won't even wipe my ass with and (2) I want the blue one too. However, that depends on whether I'm going to play Diablo II or not on the day Inn Shan goes to see the printing people.

So yeah, do you guys like this shirt? I think I'm getting better at this designing thing.



P.S. For you Manipalites, if you want to know more about the quality, printing method, the availability of the form-fitting girl style and other such boring details, head over This Post in Inn Shan's blog.



Currently a Level 27 Barbarian in Act III,
k0k s3n w4i

16 comments:

nissy said...

Yay, i'm the co-star here. Ahem.
Thank you for the design ler. You know what, i showed your design to the dean and he praised ur design leh. But he suddenly asked, "Why black shirt?". I instinctly replied, "Because the design doesn't look nice in white, according to the artist himself". :|
Punchline of the week by the dean,
"Why not red shirt?"

Discussion with the printing agent still in process...*sigh*
tiring. i still need to take care of the games, prom and stuffs..

i need a break!!

nissy said...

"Silence is Golden, but Duct Tape is Silver!"

...sounds better

fuolornis said...

i only buy produk "Buatan k0k"

long live k0k!

cute little angel said...

OMG it was a last min job??
I love it...i almost never buy college tees or whatever tees from societies cos everyone has the same one! wanna be unique ma. but when i saw the design, i decided to part with my money (which i still don't noe how much) w/o 2nd thoughts! I like the words very much and the way u used the logo. awesome!

Rileen Aya said...

i alwiz tot that manipal's color is orange? anywaes, its beautiful. so is the junior's! so.. doctor. haha

Em said...

le sigh, jelesnya. why can't my faculty come up with something like that. my batch tshirt is something i use as lapik in my drawers and only put to use when they say it's compulsory... say i really liked the tshirt where the stet was like slung over the shoulder. guess i should ciplak that for my batch tshirt, if i can get them to produce another one, that is...

nissy said...

btw, it's impossible to be lvl26 in ACT III...

Anonymous said...

i can imagine you eatin crayons in pre-school xD *giggles uncontrollably* is the cute animal spose to be a hedgehog?!! its for meeeee??!! *teary eye emote* so coohhl xD *hops up n down*

p.s i'd b so disappointed if its not a hedgehog >_>

Anonymous said...

omg so cool xD I really like d dragon tattoo. d words fan out like the wings do? xD d tail shld hv been curlier T^T

Anonymous said...

*pets imaginary hedgehog lovingly* :D

Anonymous said...

oh so it isn't a h-hog T^T

Anonymous said...

Can win even with a no touch up final submission? Woah... u must be good! hehe... u can be funny and always come out with some nice design in the end, so i no doubt your frens would buy your idea immediately after they saw it. Congrats. and all the best for the tshirt printing. Hope u get ur fav colour!

Elaynne said...

I like the orange one better! :)

Hey when will u be back in Malacca?

k0k s3n w4i said...

nissy: some effects were lost in white, actually. I think i showed u a sample, didn't I? you should tell the Dean that black makes money. Red is just going to make a lot of tablecloths.
"Silence is Golden, but Duct Tape is Shiny" is cuter. Cute wins everytime.
About Diablo, it seems that I have achieved the impossible then :P. Or maybe it's just that I'm playing the Lord of Destruction expansion, where there's a lot of in-game changes.

fuolornis: thank you veli the much, tai lou xD

cute little angel: Wow, that's really flattering :). Thanks. I think the shirts are priced at 300 rupees - 50 rupees cheaper than the floor mats last year. And from the sample, I think it's much better in quality too.

aya: the colour is actually some earthy copper brown. not very pretty. if you invert the blue I used in photoshop, it'll be precisely that brown. the steth t-shirt is not the junior design one. that's my classmate's mia. the junior one's diff.

~*caryn*~: there's always next year xD. anyhow, if you ever want to use my friend's design, let me know so I can ask her if she allows it :)

phoebe: u are so disappointed then. it's not a hedgehog. It's a rabbit, cos ur born in the year of the bunny, remember? u can see the bunny ears, and the legs, and even a bobtail! so obvious, okay T^T

gal: looks like it's only orange after all :( I guess they picked mine because of the slogan alone, everyone seemed to really like it a lot. It's kind of old to me tho' cos, i've had that idea for a whole year in my mind.

elaine: yea yea, majority wins T^T. I'm coming back early september, or earlier if I decide not to go backpacking thru the Indian south

Jen said...

where is this rabbit of which you speak!!!! i cant see it! >__<

Anonymous said...

c, even jen can't c it T^T i c the h-hog tho xD of coz i remembr i ws born in the bunny yr >_>