Hot stuff

My first pin-up for Multivers’d! Awww yeah!

…What? You thought that with my ratio of 4 ladies to 2 gentlemen, I’d focus on a woman first? Ha ha! You’re funny.

Truthfully, I was going to start with a picture of Ian and Bea making out or post-coital or just being adorable together. They’re the MAIN main characters, after all, and I’d rather show them being sexy with each other than separately. But yesterday, while going through stock art on DeviantArt, I was inspired to go with Damien first. The urge to draw a half-naked man was just too strong. XD

The AT4W fancomic is on course. The script turned out to be 18 pages long, but it’s done now. Once I’m confident I can consistently draw Linkara, Iron Liz, and Doctor Insano, I’ll be able to start comicking. I expect the comicking process to be time-consuming (being a proto-webcomic), so I’ll probably be posting a page at a time on DA, two or three times a week. It may take the rest of the summer to complete.

Speaking of That Guy With the Glasses, next week the TGWTG 3rd Anniversary mini-series “Suburban Knights” begins. “Kickassia” (the 2nd anniversary event) was just so utterly hilarious and random and fantastic, that it became an instant comfort movie. I had to buy the DVD because I watched it so much, I was getting sick of loading times. “Suburban Knights” looks like it’ll be just as good, if not better. I have a feeling I’ll be sketching a lot of fanart next week. And I can’t wait. 83

Art dump

I’ve got a few drafts in progress for future posts. In the meantime, here’s an art dump. There will probably be more of these to come, as there are a lot of things I’m determined to learn to draw (feet, people kissing, people fighting, landscapes, better perspective, etc., etc.). This summer is already proving very productive; I can’t wait to see how much I get done.

Doodles below the cut due to nudity.

Happy holidays!

May all your silent nights be warm and bright.

With much love,

Ashley

A quick catch-up post

Heya! I’m still alive. Still working on things, still dreaming of others, still discovering new obsessions. These days I’m at the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign, doing grad work in their Library and Information Science program. I have a fellowship for this semester, which means I do not have to work but can instead spend my four-day weekends lolling around playing Pokemon or playing The Whispered World (a gorgeous point-and-click 3rd-person adventure game; more on this later, perhaps).

This is the first apartment I’ve had on my own, in a city where the only person I know is my childhood friend Jessica. It’s still strange and weird and scary, and I’ve had a few breakdowns in which I’ve been convinced that I’m meant to die a hermit. I have no idea how to make friends, truthfully. I’ll have to work on that.

In the meantime, I’ve kept in touch with Liz, Vince, and Dan in Des Moines. I’m working on initiating conversations instead of believing myself a nuisance. I’m keeping busy with homework and artwork, and I spend my nights working through X-Files and Supernatural. I cook; I take care of bills and laundry; I practice 3-point perspective. Besides the whole “making friends” thing, I’ve done a lot, and I’m proud of myself.

I’ve come to a few conclusions, and I have some news about Multiversed and a few other open projects, but those can wait. For now, I wanted to share Dan’s long-overdue birthday present:

(DA)

There are lots of problems with it, I know. Perspective, for one thing. But I still like it, mainly for the adorable Dan-chibi. This was trace-inked with nib pens over a makeshift lightbox. I gave this version to Dan and kept the original sketch. This process means that there are no pencil/eraser marks on the above version, and I got to keep a physical copy. However, the tracing introduced a few of the errors (e.g. the way Dragonite’s wing mysteriously matches Arcanine’s fur), so unless I can get/make a better lightbox, I won’t be doing that again.

I’m currently working on Sarah’s gift (overdue since Christmas). Then I’ll work on one for Vince (just a week late, but promises to be longer :/ ). There are more things to show off, but I’ll leave this post as is. More next week!

The Mad Scientist War

Wheeee~! I was just going to post about my week – been out of Des Moines and around, going a bit crazy. BUT! New plan! I can now post about my Epic Picture. It really is the most epic thing I’ve ever drawn, and it took me maybe two weeks to finish. It was a secret request from Professor Zobot for his Mad Scientist Wars chapter, and now he’s posted it, and I can post about his post! You can find it here. The picture is so much better when paired with Zobot’s introduction to Chapter 15, Act 2. Seriously. Go check it out. And, if you haven’t yet, take a peek through the archives. They won’t bite! (But they may nom your free time, fair warning.)

Have you read Zobot’s post yet? Don’t worry, I’ll wait.

With a “Heavy” heart, or, Team Fortress-ian Gothic

Does it count as fanart if you draw it for the fan of an enterprise you are unfamiliar with? I vote yes, but it is a tentative yes.

I drew this Team Fortress/American Gothic ripoff as part of Dan’s Valentine’s Day card. So I used two beefy guys and a very – *coughcough*ahem - very large gun. Er. It made sense at the time, I swear! I could spend a paragraph reiterating everything Dan’s told me about the Heavy/Medic classes’ relationship, but I won’t. Suffice to say they work very well together.

Seriously, this turned out pretty well. Considering I drew and inked it in 45 minutes, with very few good references. ^^

***

Life stuff: Still not-ish working out. Every time I think “I’ve got this,” either things go sour, or I spend a lot of energy to ensure everything goes hunky-dory. Bleh. I will keep trying.

Cuteness KILLS

I… like this, I really do. Nice mixture of art styles and inking methods. Pretty decent contrast. But… where in my brain did this come from?!

I know it began as a warm-up sketch with a Potemayo-style chibi. In the Mad Scientist Wars, Professor Tinker’s character Frederic has a similar form, so I wanted some practice before I have to draw those line-up pics (and fanart). That was the intent. So where do a wet-haired woman in a kimono and an evil shadow enter the picture? WTF, brain. WTF.

…oh god no. “Caramelldansen” just started playing. My immediate thought: “Hey, I should do a MSW-Caramelldansen animation.” Despite the fact that I can’t animate drawings yet. Despite all the other projects that need to be done first, MSW fanart and otherwise. What the heck is my brain smoking?!  O.o

Current projects: one more MSW seasonal fanart, and then I have to buckle down and draw “Breaking the Fourth Wall 2008.” Trouble is, I don’t know which of the five MSW ideas to draw first. Also, I have no desire to start “4th Wall ’08.” I’m afraid to, for some reason. I know my art has grown leaps and bounds since 2007 – heck, it improved drastically just in the last few months, what with all the guys in the MSW profiles. So why don’t I want to show that off? Eesh.

MSW: The Gift-Giver

Hehe, this bit of Mad Scientist Wars fanart has at least three different names, none of which really seem to fit. The original idea was entitled “Chinchilla Reindeer,” after Dr. Amino’s preferred choice of rodent to experiment on. As you can see, the picture below has no chinchillas in it. They were cut, due to increased complexity (and because I would like to spend more time practicing drawing chinchillas).

Because Dr. Amino has returned to the Wars (heh heh heh), I can post the colored version here! Her profile in the last entry will be updated soon as well.

This is wallpaper-sized, so click the thumbnail for full view.

Yarr!  ^^  I’m ready to get started on more artsy things, but I can’t. Or more accurately, I can, but I only have one day left in Chicago. Followed by a day of driving back to Des Moines, and helping Liz move into our apartment. And I may or may not have internet at the apartment…

*sighs* This could be bad for posting. We shall see.

Caution struggled

ART DUMP!, as promised. WheeeEEEeee!

Way back when, I did door signs for my roomies, in the Fighting Game Sprite ID style stolen from DeviantArt. Unfortunately Briana graduated after the Fall 2007 semester, and Christine joined us for Spring 2008 resplendent in all her elemental glory. A new door sign was created. And was never posted on this blog. I have remedied this.

Speaking of, the sketches for the Sprite IDs were pretty awesome. Just scanned ‘em in and sprited right over the outlines. ^^

I was very proud of the sprite I did for myself. (Have I mentioned that it’s use as my banner is temporary? I will make a new one in December, I hope.)

Same with Anne’s. Compare with the flat-color sprite here.

Mad Scientist Wars doodles. I suck at drawing guys, much less guys with different body types, so I got some references of half-naked men and practiced. With art. Of course. Mmm, they needs some chest/back hairs, methinks… Ah, but I don’t think I’ve got another excuse to draw the MSW characters half-naked, so it probably doesn’t matter. Thaddeus Guy, maybe (hee – werewolf form), but other than that? …I suppose DavidxAndrew yaoi is an option, but… uh… no. No, no, no.

Discarded idea for a Writing Workshop poster. I draw dragons better now. Also, note how terrible that guy looks. Do I prove my point that I can’t draw guys? Yes. Yes I do. (They has no curves… ;_; )

Front illustration of a card I made for Bri’s graduation. From left to right, that’s me, Liz, and Anne. Zombified roomies all. The inside of the card read “We love you for your brains,” which I cheerfully stole from what is possibly my favorite Schlock Mercenary strip ever (it can be found here).

Is that enough art for you? No? No?! Sigh. Okies, one more. It’s a comic strip. Click on the image for a full-view.

I was reduced to using the same panel. Ah freshman year. When my art sucked and my humor sucked more. There’s a reason I don’t do many comics anymore… I like this one, though. A few touchups, fresh art, and it wouldn’t be completely terrible. Stars myself, childhood friend Jess, and her boyfriend John. Based on a real life conversation.

NaNoNews: Erm. I’m at 22,000 words. Nowhere close to where I need to be. I’m starting to panic again, but I have only a paper for homework, and a lot of free time before I go back to sweet home Chicago on Wednesday night. I need to keep up the enthusiasm. So to do that, I have a goodly stock of snickerdoodles and York mints. I also have started writing The End of “Spyder, Spyder.” Not the final scene, but the part in which Everything Goes Wrong. Patrick, Diane, and Nick are about to find themselves in a whole mess of trouble. The evil, evil sadist in me is reveling in this. But at least I’m writing again, right?

>.>

<.<

-_-

…Sometimes I scare myself…

***

EDIT:

Revised my NaNo reward system. Mostly because I want heavily discounted anime DVDs, not the foodstuffs I promised myself for 20,000 words. There’ll be plenty of time to fulfill my cravings for homemade food – that’s what Thanksgiving’s for, isn’t it? ^^ The other change is at 30,000 words. I don’t think I have the time to devote to reading or rereading a webcomic archive. Catching up on five webcomics is doable, though.

• 10,000 words – catch up on 5 webcomics of choice
• 25,000 words – buy $25 item for self
• 30,000 words – catch up on 5 webcomics of choice
• 40,000 words – catch up on 5 webcomics of choice
• 50,000 words – buy $25 item for self

Wrath of the felguard

Sleep schedule’s all messed up, and I just spent the last six hours sleeping instead of working on the Graphics assignment I was supposed to have done by now. NaNo updates on Wednesday, I hope.

Here we have a bit of art I did of former roomie Anne’s undead warlock, Kura – chibi-style! That long-suffering felguard minion is no mount, but she seems eager to use the carrot on a stick anyway… Seemed appropriate to post this now that the World of Warcraft expansion is out. I don’t play, but I know a fair amount of people holed up in their rooms in every free moment.

Me, I got a second-hand addiction from watching Anne play all the time last school year. Every once in awhile I get this niggling urge to try WoW out myself. But I really don’t need another addiction. Really.

Art-wise I am very happy with the way this turned out.

…Okies, back to work.