Fransis Tsai is a talented and renowned illustrator and comic book designer. Many of his pieces are being collected and purchased by international design firms such as Marvel and Nike. In 2010, at age of 42, however, due to his high stress-level at work and overwhelmingly long hours of conducting projects, he was diagnosed with the tragic and malicious ALS, and was given a life expectancy of 3 to 5 years. However, after a short time period of panic and fright, he went back to his root – designing comic book characters and illustration. As his torsal and limbs were  progressively wasting away bit by bit, he was courageous enough to use his left foot holding his iPhone, and his right big toe illustrating with a digital pen. As time passed by, when he couldn’t even use his big toe, depending on an high-tech gadget – PC Eye, he was able to continue his design work with his eyes by blinking to the screen. His “eye project” was astonishingly creative and visually appealing.

Though he passed away at age of 48 in April, 2015, I would never forget about this master of life and warrior of soul. His story showed me a lesson of a life time: owning a sense of pride no matter how cruel and blustery a situation looks like. Fransis kept his pride and purpose until the last second of his life, and left this planet with dignity and accomplishment. His is my hero!