I love Ping Pong the Animation. The story explores the pursuit of passions, and the personal goals within them which was, unsurprisingly, absolutely fascinating and extremely relevant to me. I usually latch onto (and frankly, project myself onto) a single character within a story if I relate to them enough, but in this unique case, I saw a different little bit of me in several characters over the course of the story. Many of their different attitudes aligned with aspects of my own over the course of my career, which then also shifted over the course of the story.

Given how well things have been going for me lately, including and especially with regards to my art, I believe I discovered the show at just the right time. It encouraged me to actively consider my attitude towards various aspects of what I do, why I do it, and how it reflects upon myself, as well as how that's changed over the years.

It does touch upon some existential themes which were a little harder for me to deal with, but even so, it certainly gave me a lot to think about; some of which I still have to figure out for myself, too.

The opening themesong, Tadahitori, was probably what left the first, biggest impression on me. While some of the lyrics' meaning probably gets lost in translation (there's at least three subtly different takes on it), the intent and message that I could garner from it stuck with me quite strongly either way. By the end of the show, with all the separate plot threads tied up and the repercussions laid out, I knew I couldn't let that feeling of purpose that it gave me fade away without committing it to canvas.

There's more about the creative process below the illustration.

I originally set out to try mimicking the anime's rough, gritty, apparently almost careless style (which I mean in an entirely good way), but it was too far a departure from my usual smooth, clean lines, and ended up being impossible for me to pull off in a single attempt. The brush I chose for the lines frankly does most of the work towards achieving a similar look at all, and even then, I ended up finishing the piece by polishing the linework even more, only diverging further from what I originally meant to do.

That having been said, I'm still very pleased with the result. The whole process effectively served as an exercise in reflecting on my achievements, looking back on a lot of my recent work and celebrating it in my own way. I think it does a good job of conveying the joy that I've felt lately with making and sharing things with you all, even if it can sometimes be a rather lonely and daunting endeavor.

Basically, I'm altogether excited, optimistic, and determined to keep doing more and better in spite of all of that, and the song's lyrics very much spoke to those same feelings I've been grappling with over the years. 💝✨