Mixed Media Missive: A MultiScale 8 String Guitar

 

And the first thing I found:

I originally bought my Ibanez 7 String for the metal low end, but found down tuning my 6 strings gave better results much of the time.  And that is what Mattias IA Eklundh had said, and he didn't think 7 strings were worth the trouble. But he did fall in love with the 8 string.

I thought about that quite a bit, but couldn't justify the 748,000円  ( which is some 16 times more than I paid for my best Ibanez RG 6 string) for his Caparison Apple Horn 8  or a similar amount for his new ULV8 above.  I don't think of my self as a Guitarist, but just a guy mucking around making my own silly music in my studio. I didn't think some 188,000円 for an Ibanez RGMS8 \ RGD8 was for me either. The other thing was that 8 string guitars are rather rare around these parts. Went to the main guitar stores in Osaka and no one had any to try.  For me, Multiscale is they way to keep an 8 string guitar playable.

I started hearing about this Really Cheap/ Incredible value Thomann Music Harley Benton R-458MN WH MultiScale 8 String Guitar. Problem was that with the current Yen exchange rate in June 2024, it isn't a cheap guitar any more if I paid Japanese Yen and bought it online from Germany.

Then I did an illustration job for USD$ and that exchange rate problem vanished. 😁  

So I ordered one. I paid USD $251.87 via PayPal for it. Took 13 days to arrive, and then had to pay 1,652円 import duty to the Postman when he delivered it to my door.  Not expensive at all.

And in my studio it looks like this:

And comparing to my Ibanez RG, shows the fan frets, bridge slant, and neck width differences from a standard guitar.

Before it arrived I had seen that UGRITONE were closing and going out of business and so picked up their AMPENSTEIN Amp/cabinet/effects/eq VST for USD$10.  What PayPal is useful for when you live in Japan.  

Up until now I mostly used Boogex amp sim vst with GOD CABINET IRs with a real Metal Zone Distortion Pedal.  At the moment AMPENSTEIN EQ and IR Loader seem to be best in my Reaper DAW way of recording guitar the 8 string.  Can cut and boost multiple frequencies as needed.

Have found the Guitar Tuner in it is way more convenient for tuning the 8 string than my Korg strobe tuner. 

It has only been a few days so far, so along way from learning all I need to.

I found my guitar didn't have any of the QC problems some had reported. It is all good, for a cheap guitar. Tuning is similar to my Ibanez GIO 7 string in that the nut is sticky, and the tuners not mechanically so precise. 

I have the 8 string set up like my other guitars. Instead of E standard, they are down tuned to D# and the lower 7 strings are thus in DROP G#.  The 1 finger power chords are more defined than in my 7 string, probably due to the longer strings there.  I had to redo the intonation on the 7th and 8th strings in this tuning, and the 8th string "almost" didn't allow the saddle to move back enough, without replacing the saddle screw with a shorter one. 

I currently have the 8th string as D#, the lower D# than the D# 6th string.  Finding that very undefined though, and think it needs to be higher instead.  The fret 1~ 5 spacing on the low strings is a bit of a stretch. But I don't notice it most of the time.

It feels very much like my Fender Squire, but with 8 strings. Except the bridge pickup in that is a  DiMarzio HS-3 that is worth as much as the whole 8 string guitar!

I still need to work with the 8 string more. There isn't anything wrong with the fretwork or anything, but I normally do pinch harmonics all the time, but they just don't happen on this.  Need to work out why that is. The 7 String doesn't stop me playing  pinch harmonics. Curious.  May be related to the way the bridge is slanted and the way I have to hold my right hand with a Multiscale.

The guitar has Active pickups.  Have noticed, with the Metal Zone on with my extreme distortion/gain s settings, they seem to generate a midrange tone (a very low level oscillation in the opamp circuit maybe?) some -30db down. Not anything to worry me though, taken care of with a noise gate if need be.

So far a very interesting experience, but I am still treating it pretty much like a 7 string, and still to work out how I deal with that 8th string for what I do.  Meshuggah math metal or the DOOM soundtrack isn't what I do.  I have seen Mattias play now, and is all over Freak Kitchen's Every Body Gets Bloody Album, but have no idea how often he actually touches that 8th string.  

Will update this in the coming week or so with new thoughts or findings...

Seems I need to bring my right hand more over the bridge pickup to get the pitch harmonics. The multiscale looks deceptively similar, but seems it isn't. 

Main thing now is, what do I want to do with it? I haven't done anything much different from my 7 string, so that is I need to learn something new to use it. 

There really is nothing to complain about this guitar for what you pay for it.  I would be in exactly the same position now if I had paid 4 times more for a locally available Ibanez. 

I changed the 7th and 8th string tuning again. Not a drop tuning though, like the rest of my guitars are at the moment. High, to Low, they are now D#, A#, F#, C#, G#, D#, A#, F .  This makes 8th string to not be floppy, like it is if D#.

I need some washers in the 8th & 7th string bridges to get better intonation, but no rush.   Needs to move back a bit more and the screw length means it hits the string. Washers, rather than a shorter screw is the simpler solution.

And another just getting use to the feel of it, and about Cartoon Strips:

 

We can be found at ArtAndTechnology

Mixed Media Missive: Name Cards and Stickers in Japan

A few weeks ago I needed some name cards and used a DIY AVERY kit I had for many years to make up a few.  Actually needed them before then, and didn't have any. Not having really gone out much in the previous 3 years had numbed my sense of their significance in Japan.

The only issue is the AVERY cards look DIY. The card thickness, and edges is the big give away.

As this is Japan, which is still the land of the Meishi (Business Card), I needed a proper card. Again. Even if  "retired"!  When you leave a company, they take your business cards from you. A thing that displayed your position and status. What company you worked for carries more weight than you might think, even if what you achieved isn't up for casual conversation. Dressing appropriately and being polite,  not speaking too casually, are also really important, and probably not just Kyoto.😀

A refresher course on the giving of your business card and receiving theirs:

I had so may older unused ones at home though, with different positions (and name spellings!) on them from over the years. Not that they could be used any more.

For my new name cards, I wanted the contact details to be big, as I am at an age where I can't read them on a standard card with the text size they use with my glasses on.  An old man problem. 

The old question:

Japan has a long tradition of name cards/ calling cards. Senjafuda are those name stickers all over shrines.  They had a rather different format than the modern business card, being a sticker.

Since doing the DIY name cards, I came across the online Sticker Japan  ( and raksul ,  mojoprint , oneprint  and others ) for  having Stickers and Business Cards made in quantities, from artwork you upload. Raksul also does T-SHIRTs, but have no idea of the quality, as their boast of being the cheapest isn't actually a good thing for me. I have yet to find out if one is better than the other. 

I am still waiting on the FREE sample pack of sticker samples and business cards from StickerJapan to be able to see the materials. Whois search indicates the dns is registered and owned by someone in the UK , so quality probably isn't their focus.  I had expected to get this pack 2 days ago, and it didn't come in the mail today either. This isn't encouraging. One of the 3 reviews on there Facebook page is 粗悪な印刷物を納品して対応なし (Delivered inferior printed materials and no response). Some are printed in Incheon South Korea.

There are many places online, but would I trust the Sponsored, top of the list places? No.

Anyway... 

I have designed stickers and business cards for customers at various times, and find the option of designing my own attractive. But as my freelance illustration work is purely online, I have never needed, or made, or used, a Business Card for it. But when you are given a card here, you need to give something back.

Some earlier concepts of a sticker, my Heavy Metal Garage Sticker  (I used Sticker Mule in the USA) and reference designs for size and materials:

After considering Name Card and color sticker options and costs, these are my likely designs. Unexpectedly, a customer that wanted things done 2 weeks ago when I was busy, didn't get back to me this week after I emailed I could do their job now, so had plenty of time to consider my own project. 

 Production files are .AI from Illustrator CS3 in my case:

A Name Card is purely to give out basic contact and name info in the standard 91mm x 55mm Japanese format. Best way for me to remember the persons name for more than 4 seconds after meeting them! Minimum order quantity is 100.  Exchanging business Cards is a ritual in Japan 😀.

The Sticker is more an "about me" thing, and I am likely to meet very few people to ever give one away to.  But you never know. So far this year I could have given away, maybe a sticker and 7 name cards.

In looking at the options for stickers, materials and quantities I am thinking Outdoor PVC "bumper sticker" material and making only 10 initially. 10 could be a "rest of my life" quantity😐 .  I looked at 60mm x 60mm round & square formats but decided that an 80mm x 55 mm design means they can be carried with my name cards and fit in my phone case.

This year, 2024, I have been given more business cards and met more new people than I have in the previous 8 years.

An issue I always had as an employee that rarely met anyone to gave out a business card to, was the few in my Wallette always got bent and did not make a good impression when I gave one to someone unexpectedly. The last 3 places I worked in Australia as an employee didn't give me a company business card at all. 

But this being Japan means there are many card carrying case options.  And this doesn't include the expensive leather cases a Business man could lust over.

When I go "out" now I always take a shoulder bag or a back pack, depending on where and for how long I will be out, and now keep a business card case containing my cards and stickers in all of them. So no matter which one I grab, I will be prepared. At the moment, just with my DIY Name Cards and the Heavy Metal Garage stickers.

StickerJapan sample pack arrived. All look great. Took 10 days, and comes from South Korea.

I could put my color sticker design on the back of my Name Card. But for most people I give it too, that would be too much information. A plan Name Card means I can stick a few color stickers to the back of some, and achieve a similar result.  Gives me options.  Way over thinking this  😁. 

And 100 cards arrived 9 days after placing order and paying from South Korea. They look good.

We will now wait another 8 days to see how the color stickers come out 😀, but these are more important. Wish I had made them end of 2023.  I now have a metal and a Leather card holder. More important than you probably think.

And the stickers arrived. Matte Paper. All look very good. Just as expected.  A bad review on the internet may have been done for reasons that have nothing to do with do they do good work or not!

More about the customer didn't prepare their files correctly.

And the why of the sticker: 

Then we made some MEGACURVE stickers, and they arrived in 3 days. Great quality'

We can be found at ArtAndTechnology

2024/6/13: Yasuhiko Yoshikazu Exhibit Hyogo (兵庫県立美術館)

 

Went to the Hyogo Prefecture Museum of Art  (兵庫県立美術館, Hyōgo Kenritsu Bijutsukan) for Yasuhiko Yoshikazu: Divine Animator and Draftsman.

I first heard of him from his episode of Urasawa Noaki's Manben neo NHK E TV series. This showed his astounding draftsmanship, even at 76, were he didn't need to do any rough working lines, and just drew the scene. Started characters with their eyebrows. He also didn't storyboard anything first. He put that down to originally working as an animator, where there was no time for rough line work. He had only later become a "history based - truth is stranger than fiction" manga creator.

It was his original manga pages that I wanted to see. The kind of thing that wasn't on display at Nagano san's Nagoya Exhibit I attended last month.

Hyogo is almost a 2 hour train trip, using normal (not the Shinkansen) trains from home. I had to switch from Express to Local trains a few times to get there in a reasonable time.  It isn't that far on a nice day, and not that expensive, under 3,000 yen. I don't know exactly what each leg cost, as I only check how much money I have left on my travel card when I exit a station, and soon forget what a leg actually cost. 

The Hyogo Prefecture Museum of Art has a frog wearing a hat on the roof. The place is also referred to as HAT. A 10 minute down a slight slope walk or so from Nada JR station. This is my second visit. The first was in 2018 with my wife to a Ghibli exhibit.

The only photo I took in the exhibit was of this cartoon he did of him self on the VIP visitor message board.  He signs all his work YAS, a detail like that is interesting to me.

This was because no one else was taking photos and almost all the works on display are in the massive 415 page show Catalog book. So I bought that, and just stared in awe at his draftsmanship, penwork and brush stroke technique on display in the original artworks. Lots of original pages with screen tone and speech balloon text, and original watercolor covers.

He had wanted to become a Mangaka, but that originally didn't work out for him, so he became an animator instead, and later animation director.

He was an animator for the original Gundam, Crusher Joe and other things. Many of his storyboards, key frames, concept roughs, character designs and painted illustrations were on display from these productions. These were probably what many visitors were focused on, and had that nostalgic pull for them. I haven't seen any of them.

He eventually lost interest in animation and returned to his first love, creating his own manga.  I think it is because he didn't own the IP of the animation he worked on, that he isn't so widely known outside Japan. Or maybe because it was Gundam he worked on?

I attend these exhibits to inspire my own creations. This exhibit certainly did that and was truly awesome. So much work on display from a single creator. Wonderful.  Luckily there were benches to rest my weary legs for the last half of the exhibit . 

I really love that I can get to these far flung Art Galleries incredibly cheaply and quickly.

Travelling by train is just so very convenient in Japan, and I listen to music all the way. I actually had Freak Kitchen's new Everybody Gets Bloody on constant repeat for much of it. Thank you IA.

Next exhibit planning to attend is GIANT ROBOTS, that gets to my local THE MUSEUM OF KYOTO second week of July. Only 35+ minutes away.

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Re-watched Zeiram for first time in 33 years

 

So re-watched Zeiram for first time in 33 years. First time was on a Laserdisc, this time on a second hand DVD.

The director likes, action, SF design, monsters, stop frame animation, comedy, and he stuck all that in while "borrowing" from James Cameron and Ridley Scott.

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Other Comics, that aren't

 

Making a bust of Zeiram 2's IRIA from the optional part.

Cool MAVE AI figther in Frankenstrat Camo

Tiny Gashapon Powered Amor Diorama

Making 1/8 scale Babylon 5's Delenn

I posted these to a Facebook Modelling Group, rather than just text and a bunch of pictures, like you normally would. 

I would prefer to try something else in my own format, so I did.

We can be found at ArtAndTechnology