1 new wallpaper (Toward the Terra - Tears for Terra)

1 new wallpaper: Toward the Terra - Tears for Terra (Art Nouveau)

I started this wallpaper over a year ago, having finished the character artwork trace fairly quickly. It then sat on my hard drive for many months as I never got around to completing the Art Nouveau-styled frame for it. Then, last week the Northeastern Japan earthquake and tsunami struck… I wanted to show my support for Japan, so I looked through my work-in-progress folder and found this. It was oddly fitting, seeing Jomy and Physis mourning for a home they never had, while many Japanese mourn for a home that is lost… [more]

1 new wallpaper (Lupin the Third - Catch me if you can)

1 new wallpaper: Lupin the Third - Catch me if you can (Art Deco)

Another wallpaper with some Art Deco sensibilities. This one is based off of the fabulous opening sequence to Catch Me if You Can. At first I was going to use Bebop characters (which also has a classy Deco vibe to the art) and was going to call it "Bebop if you can", but the more I thought about it, the more Lupin fit, what with Zenigata vs Lupin's crew... [more]

1 new wallpaper (Tonari no Totoro - Travelogue 02: Ride the CatBus)

1 new wallpaper:
Tonari no Totoro - Travelogue 02: Ride the CatBus (Art Deco)

Second in my Art Deco Travelogue series. To recap, I absolutely love Art Deco travel posters, so I wanted to create a series of wallpapers of travel posters for the Anime world. This one features the Fast - Friendly - Fuzzy service of the Cat Bus from My Neighbor Totoro... [more]

1 new wallpaper (Okami - Zodiac: Tiger)

1 new wallpaper:
Okami - Zodiac: Tiger (Ukiyo-e)

Happy New Year! Today marks the start of the year of the Tiger, so how about a new Okami wall featuring a tiger? [more]

1 new wallpaper (Vocaloid - Singing Through the Noise)

1 new wallpaper:
Vocaloid - Singing Through the Noise (Grunge)

I chose this scan because somehow I liked the style (when I later found related scans and learned they were all by Miwa Shirow, I figured out why -- I like Shirow's bold lines and use of black.) Anyhow, a trace to clean things up, and then it was time for grunge... [more]

Back to the old grind

So I've been away from walling for nearly a year. This isn't that I've completely stopped walling, it's that I needed a break, and real-world obligations became more important.
First, I'd been making roughly 1 wall per month from 2007-early 2009 (this was down from about 2-3 walls per month in years past.) That's actually quite a bit of walling considering I have a full-time job and a desire to have a social life. I felt obligated to keep walling at that speed because I had done it for so long, and it was beginning to weigh down.
Additionally, work suddenly turned up a notch. There was a major new Toolbar release (version 6), and I also picked up responsibilities for Chrome which had several launches (although I did get to sneak in a few of my own designs in the Google-created themes gallery, which is awesome.) I also went to New York for a week to kick off themes in Google Spreadsheet Forms (again, I added some of my own designs in the mix -- Zen Spring is every~where♥.)
All of a sudden, in spring of 2009 I was asked if I was interested in working from the Tokyo office for a year. The branch of our team that handles Asia/Pacific requests needed some help and was hoping to get a seasoned webmaster out of HQ, and asked for me.
To which I almost immediately said, "Sign me up!"
The next few months were spent getting ready for the move (paperwork) and transferring some projects to others so I could take on new ones in Tokyo. And then, I moved!
It's been a busy few months transitioning over, finding an apartment, figuring out how to pay the utility bills, and meeting all the awesome people in the Tokyo office. Now things are finally settling down, and I'm ready to get back to some walling!
I don't expect to be able to match the 1 wallpaper/month speed I had previously. I'm not going to try to. I'm just going to make walls when I feel like it. I have some ideas and I'm going to fly with them as I see fit. So sit back and relax, and perhaps subscribe to the feed for updates (or add me to watchlists on Minitokyo or AnimePaper) because I'm still here, and I still mean to stay.
Also, I have totally, utterly missed DA!'s Nth birthday in May. I'm working on a new layout right now, actually. Maybe it'll be up in time to celebrate 2010. It's always good to start the New Year off with a clean slate, right?

The state of the site

So obviously I haven't been making any walls lately. I've been busy with work, and a whole lot of it. Toolbar, Chrome, and Docs have all had numerous launches, and I've also been working on a variety of other projects. I have also recently bought a Nintendo DSi and have been rediscovering my love for SNES RPGs, as well as a love for BBC America programming. I haven't even turned on my desktop computer in several months, doing all my stuff on my work laptop.

I'd like to continuing making wallpapers, but right now I don't feel a whole lot of motivation. Maybe I'll find some inspiration when...

I move to Japan!

I will be working from Japan for a year starting in August, helping out our team in Tokyo. This is a big change and I'm really excited, and also kind of freaking out over all the stuff I need to wrap up before I do so. Definitely not going to have anything out before then. Maybe afterwards. Time will tell.

No wallpaper for February

Unless I manage to either a) freeze time or b) steal a TARDIS, there's not going to be a wallpaper for February.
This is what's been keeping me busy all month.
I may just manage to squeak out a new iGoogle theme, but February is a short month...

1 new wallpaper (Okami - Zodiac: Ox)

1 new wallpaper:
Okami - Zodiac: Ox (Ukiyo-e)

I've been wanting to make a series of Okami walls that features each of the Zodiac animals for a while now, and what better time to launch this than at the beginning of the Year of the Ox... [more]

1 new wallpaper (Uchuu no Stellvia - Travelogue 01: Your road to the stars)

3 wallpapers in one month? Must be the holidays!

1 new wallpaper:
Uchuu no Stellvia - Travelogue 01: Your road to the stars (Art Deco)

One in what I hope to be a series of Art Deco styled travel posters, encouraging you to visit the farthest reaches of the anime world, because Art Deco has the classiest-looking travel posters, and I love the style so. First up, why not take a voyage to Foundation II: Stellvia, your road to the stars? [more]

I guess I am giving up on the whole walltip for every wall thing. Maybe I'll just post random walltips? Later?

1 new wallpaper (Terra e - Peace on Earth)

1 new wallpaper:
Terra e - Peace on Earth (Celestial)

Happy Holidays (2008) everyone! Instead of a standard snow-laden wallpaper with anime characters in Santa hats, I thought I'd do something a little different - a standard Holiday message of peace and hope for the world. I must admit I have no idea what this series, Terra E, is about...[more]

Still no walltips. Maybe later.

1 new wallpaper (The Big O - Obey Giant [Robot])

1 new wallpaper (finally!):
The Big O - Obey Giant [Robot] (Minimalistic)

Perhaps one of the most iconic works from the Obama campaign is Shepard Fairey's "Progress" (later "Hope") poster. In homage to both Obama and Fairey, I wanted to make an anime version. The simple use of colors reminded me of the Big O soundtrack art. And hey, it's a different Big "O"... [more]

P.S. I made this wall in about 2 hours... so I'll have to think of a relavant walltip later.

No wallpaper for November

I won't be able to finish a wallpaper for November, mostly because I'm housesitting at my parents and don't have access to my desktop where all my files and art programs are stored. My dad does have Photoshop, but the walls I'm working on include at least some vector component, so they'll have to wait.
In the meantime, I'm working on a bunch of iGoogle themes. I just finished a snowflake one, and I'm going to create a Japanese paper pattern theme to complement the Chinese papercut theme I already have up. I'm also in the planning stages for a separate site for my themes, since they're all just using a wiki page on Google Code which is very plain.
I'm hoping that Gmail themes will be opened to the public with an API similar to that for iGoogle, because I'd love to make themes for Gmail as well. I've already made a few themes internally (a port of the Tetris theme, a green floral variant of papercuts, and a glossy theme like the DA! v10 layout) and I'd love to make these available to the public.

1 new wallpaper (Okami - Let Sleeping Wolves Lie)

1 new wallpaper:
Okami - Let Sleeping Wolves Lie (Ukiyo-e)

It's been a while, but I'm still here and walling... As you can see, I still love Okami artwork. The image of a napping Amaterasu was too sweet to pass up. She looks so relaxed and cozy... [more]

1 new wallpaper (Lily Hoshino - Thank you for smoking)

1 new wallpaper:
Artist: Lily Hoshino - Thank you for smoking (Pop Art)

I am currently working through a backlog of bishounen walls, because dammit, we girls need more bishounen to decorate our computers with. Why should guys get all the skimpily-clad eye candy? Except this isn't a skimpily-clad bishounen. But the smoking. That's sexy, isn't it? [more]

1 new wallpaper (Full Metal Alchemist - Monster)

1 new wallpaper:
Full Metal Alchemist - Monster (Pop Art)

So I figured I'd celebrate DA!'s 8th birthday with a bishounen wall, and I liked the uber-angsty pose of Edward in this scan and the fact you couldn't see his face. Plus: BELLYBUTTON. Anyway, Ellegarden's alternative stylings are totally super emo-factor and perfect for the wall, so I chose the song "Monster" as the theme... [more]

Happy 8th Birthday, DA!

DA! turns 8 years old today. It's rather a scary thought that I've had this site around for that long. It started when I was just entering college, and now I've already got a Masters degree and have been at my job at Google for over two years. Just crazy.
Anyway, as with previous birthdays, I celebrate by giving DA! a new layout. This year, I decided to go extremely over-the-top with Web 2.0 sensibilities (or insensibilities depending on your views.) This means shiny chrome, lots of soft gradients, and oodles of reflections everywhere. I was originally going to keep the rotating headers, but never found any other images that seemed to fit the header as well as the Kino no Tabi image that currently graces the top. I figured the slick 2.0-style UI was a nice about-face from the previous Zen, Chinese classical layout, of which I remain quite fond of (I almost wanted to keep it for another year, but decided that change was still good.)
I removed the resource section, since I hadn't updated it since two versions ago, and wasn't really planning to ever do so. I replaced it with a local syndication of this blog, mostly because one of the things I've learned to do at work is syndicate Blogger feeds in all sorts of static HTML files. I've always wanted to integrate the blog more into the look and feel of the website, and with Blogger feeds this is really easy. Of course you can still view the blog on Blog*Spot if you feel so inclined. This ensures that all sections of the site remain fresh and interesting.
Well, I'm off to another day at Fanime con. Hopefully I'll finish my next wall in a few days, but as you can see, I was a bit busy with this redesign.

1 new wallpaper (Keroro Gunsou - Keroro Laundry Service)

1 new wallpaper:
Keroro Gunsou - Keroro Laundry Service (Scenic)

My entry for Which?Waller Round 5: Leap Year. The scan amused me, so I traced Keroro off of it. I was lazy and didn't want to do a full background so I traced a bit of the background, recycled some clouds from my RxJ OMGPONIES!11 wall, and encircled everything to look like a sort of badge... [more]

1 new wallpaper (Katamari Damacy - This is how we bowl)

1 new wallpaper:
Katamari Damacy - This is how we bowl (Minimalistic)

I originally drew this katamari for work... It reminded me of another illustration I did that involved bowling for Lava Lamps. Except that bowling with a katamari would result in some... interesting outcomes... [more]

1 new wallpaper (Jigoku Shoujo - Hell Flowers)

1 new wallpaper:
Jigoku Shoujo - Hell Flowers (Minimalistic)

The inspiration for the setup of this wallpaper came from oPtion$, the Fake Steve Jobs book about the Apple back-dating options scandal. In one of the first chapters, (fake) Steve describes his Ultimate Frisbee uniform: "black shorts, black socks, black shoes, and a black mock turtleneck T-shirt with a tiny black Apple logo silk-screened on the shirt, a shade darker than the shirt itself, so that you can barely see it. In other words, classy." I liked the "black on black" concept...[more]