Action Scenes

Now that I'm somewhat comfortable with my ability to drawn characters and anatomy, I want to also practice drawing characters in scenes with other characters. This is important, because it emphasizes relationships, composition, and perspective rather than just characters hovering in space on a flat background. 

The two above images are drawings I did over Christmas break when I had a few minutes to myself. They are quick and rough, but I'm happy with the practice behind them. The topmost picture is of Yellow and Skull Atla fighting each other. I'm very happy with their expressions and poses. However, it could be pushed more to emphasize the contact between them. Right now that's a little stiff. The second picture is of nothing in particular. I just wanted to draw it. I'm happy with the perspective. The anatomy could be better. 

This is a drawing sort of in the style of Lauren that I did a while back. The figure is different, but similar. This is still a single figure, but the composition is better.

I did this one a while ago, and I think it turned out pretty cool. I like the character designs, the composition, and the relationship here. I don't really know the larger story behind it, but I like it.

This one is simple compared to the other images, but it's still practicing having more than one character in a scene and showing a relationship between them.

God be with me. God come back soon. See you in the new year. I love you.

Flash Fanart

 

Some quick fanart I did tonight of the DC superhero the Flash. Thinking back, I'm not sure I've posted any of my art of him on here before. I'd have to go back and look to make sure. Mostly, I just wanted to practice an interesting perspective. I didn't get it exactly right, but you get the idea. For something this quick, I'm very satisfied. 

I'm doing well. The semester is drawing to a close. I was talking to God tonight about how I feel like doing more just for my own edification, but I also feel tired all the time. God's will be done. Christ will lead me on. Love you, God.

Hikers First Arc

 

 

https://tapas.io/episode/2513822

 So back in the spring, I started a webcomic. I just finished the first sort-of hook for the overall comic that will serve as an introduction, and I figured I should put a link to the comic here. This will make it easier to navigate to from this blog. A hook should serve as a miniature version of the rest of the story, and that's what I want for this bit.

The image above is a drawing I did for the title page before I even started on the first page. There are some inconsistencies with the characters' designs between here and the first few pages, but that's to be expected with a developing webcomic. I just made this to be fun and to get practice. Consistency is a happy accident where it's found. 

God save me. Lord's will be done. I love you.

Atla Short Story

 

 This is a picture that goes along with the short story I wrote here. I've put it on this blog before, but I thought it made sense to put here again. 

Atla Short Story

Slight content warning. This story includes violence, gun violence, violence nearby a school, and child endangerment, though no children are harmed. There's also the use of minor swears like "shit." If you watch Marvel films, you're probably fine. 

 So I've been working on this short story for a while now. I had the initial inspiration for it earlier this spring. I was exploring a feeling I had that the main character shares. Overall, I'm very happy with how it turned out. The climax is resolved through sacrifice and compassion instead of violence, which is important to me. One of my favorite ways stories can cause a turning point is when one character teaches another character something they need to change about themselves. It feels very natural to the real world. I also like the foreshadowing and the character development I manged to squeeze into this short story. 

God be with me. Lord save me. I need you all the time. Amen.

Gently

The title of this post is a reference to a line from Princess Bride, which will only make sense when you see the last picture in this post. Here are some sketches I've done as time has allowed.

This picture is done in pen. I would've wanted to redraw the hands otherwise. 

Had this image in my mind. Not really sure where it came from. It's basically a creepy evil bunny rabbit with human arms.

Experiments with subtly different eyes and body shapes.

This drawing was done during a session of Dungeons and Dragons that I'm doing at the library I'm working at. It's an ongoing weekly program. I'm helping keep everything on track as part of my work. So I'm basically getting paid to play Dungeons and Dragons for three hours a week. My life is pretty sweet.

God be with me. I love you. Lord save me.

Draw Your Feelings

 

As you can see, most of these drawings are from about a month ago. They say "draw your feelings," so while I was in class I drew a monkey warrior and some characters inspired by the games Resident Evil and Evil Within. School is going okay. I just got exhausted after a while. I've experienced a bit of a crash it feels like, but I know God is taking care of me. I can't tell yet if I'm out of the rut, but I do feel somewhat better. I'll just have to keep going. 

I liked drawing these characters because they're different from what I'm used to. The woman in the next-to-last drawing was fun to figure out how her anatomy works.

God be with me. I love you.

Jetty the Magic Girl

 

So I had an idea for a tv series about classic magical girls versus Lovecraftian monsters. That's not too original, but the series would also take major inspiration from the comic that first inspired me: Atomic Robo. It's a really great series for all ages. You should read it. I was inspired most by Volume 3: The Shadow From Out of Time and Volume 7: The Flying She Devils of the Pacific. The hypothetical show Magical Girls Versus Cosmic Ones would also take a lot of historical inspiration, including a sort-of Ghibli-esque steampunk aesthetic. I've outlined the episodes of the first season and all the major characters. 

Jetty (pictured above) is from the mid-1800s. She was taken from her universe by a cosmic evil and rescued by magical girls from another universe. Now she works with them to fight evil and return to her world. Jetty's design is based mostly on Kiki from Kiki's Delivery Service, Alice Liddell's design from Cheshire Crossing, and pictures of Ada Lovelace. Her design would need some tweaking and added details, but I'm happy with it for now. 

If I could, would I spend all my time making this show real? Yes. Am I in graduate school with two jobs? Also yes. God be with me. God's will be done for this idea, just like all my ideas. I love you.

Canny the Friendly Ghost With Work Problems

 This is an idea I had for a character. It's fairly simple, just a man who is a sheet-headed ghost who struggles in his patent attorney job and other areas of his life. No matter how powerful or dapper you are, life (or unlife) is hard. It's not a good enough concept for me to really work on, but I thought it would be fun to draw him tonight.

 

I spent some time deciding how to do his eyes and head sheet. But his design was pretty finalized in my head from the beginning.

This is a small reference image I did for the next picture.

 "And now, Margaret Wellenek of Tax Form Management, you will return my calls." 

Here is the picture based on the one I was referencing. I'm glad I did the reference first. I'm so happy I've got better perspective skills now. 

God be with me. Lord have mercy on me. I need it. I love you.

More Pose Work

So, school has started at this point. It might be a while before I have anything from school to share on this blog. My classes are mostly programming and a production that's supposed to remain secret until after its done. But I've been doing some important work doodling in and outside of class (and church). It can't hurt to try to get different methods of drawing forms to look good from different angles. These pictures were each drawn without visual reference, so you know I like that.

I don't know what the next step is, and it might have to wait until until school hits a lull. I think it might be trying for more realistic proportions like 90s anime style, animating something else in Blender, or modeling something simple in Blender. We'll see.

God be with me. I love you. God's will be done. Lord save me.

Animated Punch in Blender

 

This is my practice of an animated punch in in the software Blender, just to try and get a feeling for how it's done. I should be more excited than I am, because this is pretty cool. I just kind of used up all my energy figuring out Blender's obtuse systems. Hopefully next time will go faster.

I'll need to remember to hold on each of the frames for longer. Sometimes, some of the frames don't play in YouTube and sometimes they do. I'd recommend playing it at a slower speed if you want to see all the frames. Overall, this is pretty cool to me. I think this is a good step in the process of wrangling Blender. We'll see. 

Thank you, God, for everything. I love you. God's will be done.

Gesture Practice (and Others)

So today and Wednesday, I did a lot of drawing practice. I wanted to show it here, because I like it. The picture above is some gestural/form drawings I did after watching the first part of a few videos to see if there was any concrete advice they could give that I hadn't heard before. It was good stuff, but I got tired of focused self-improvement, so I did the next two drawings afterwards as something fun. 

The above picture is fan art for the Slugcat in the indie game Rain World. Unfortunately, I haven't had a chance to play the game myself because it costs money. But Rain World first appeared on my radar in a video which broke down how they used physics simulation for the animations to give the Slugcat and other animals a unique feel and controls. Cool stuff. Anyway, this image was done without reference.

This next picture (above) is a product of a bunch of different stuff. The gestural drawing practice, practicing Disney faces, an image in my head, etc. It's got a few mistakes in it, but I'm satisfied with it for the amount of work. 

The remaining pictures are all from Wednesday. Lots of different sketchy stuff- most of it just for fun. They're in reverse order of when I drew them except for a couple.

The above picture is fan art for the Sarah Andersen webcomic series Fangs. It got published in a book. We actually have a copy at the library I work at. Anyway, this drawing was done with just a memory of  the original, which is why it looks... less good. It's a great series, though it does handle some adult themes so be aware of that.

The above is one of three drawings I made of this character "Fuzzy" Bellman. I only liked this drawing enough to put it on here. Fuzzy is a character from a personal comic I'm writing called "the Exceptionals." It's a comic I only write when I'm angry, so that says something about it's content. Basically, I wanted to take some of the most messed-up people I could think of, give them unconventional powers, and see what they did with them. Fuzzy's power is "Rarity Manipulation." She can alter how much of a certain kind of object there is in the world (and possibly the universe).

 

 The above picture has drawings of different face explorations. Three of them are based on Brennan Lee Mulligan, the author of the webcomic series Strong Female Protagonist, which is the best webcomic I've ever read, and possibly the best comic. It deals with the philosophical implications of superpowers in a realistic world through the perspective of one very complex character. It's like it was made just for me. Anyway, these next three drawings are of the main character of SFP. Her name is Alison Green, and when I draw her in my style she coincidentally looks like some drawings I did of Supergirl: 8th Grade Superhero a little while ago, which is funny to me.

These last two pictures are simple character drawings I did in different styles to see if I could.

 God is good. It's almost the end of summer. I've done some good work. I've improved a bit. God has kept me and the people around me safe. God protect me. I love you. God's will be done.

Summer Characters

 More art practice today. Let me show it for you. 

These are going to be in order. First off is something from last night. This is fanart of, actually, Imogen Temult, who is a character from Critical Role. What I find interesting about this is that I didn't feel like drawing fanart of Imogen in particular. I think her design has some interesting elements I wanted to attempt in my style, particularly her pronounced lips and mid-length, curly hair. Usually, my characters have indiscernible lips and short hair in anime style triangles. This picture, and some other practice, made me realize I've still been drawing the heads too big in proportion to the body and the neck too long. Let's see what happens when I practice not doing that... 

Unrelated character. You'll notice the neck is shorter and the head smaller. This was drawn mostly to experiment with a different method of drawing a feminine body. See the three lines that make up the torso below the pectorals? And how the back is concave?

This was practice doing faces from a character from the anime Land of the Lustrous, which is an anime about gem people defending their home from invaders from the moon. This character is "Phosphophyllite" or "Phos" for short. It's a 3D CGI series that incorporates CGI and 2D better than almost anything else I've seen, especially on tv. I didn't sign this picture because I used a reference.

This is one of mine. A picture using what I've practiced. You'll note the style of the eyes, the distance between the nose and mouth, the body shape, and the hands. Proportions between the upper and lower body are still off. I should've put more time into those before drawing the desk.

Now this is nice. Slight bird's-eye-view. New eye shape. Good proportions. Decent work on the hands. And, of course, the mouth is the right distance from the nose. 

Here's something a little different. Dynamic posing with one finger pointed towards the "camera." I got his back arm in the right place, which I'm very happy about. The foreshortening is good, as are the proportions. I like the expression I did. He definitely looks pretty crazy.

Part of my interest in drawing cute characters is that it helps you draw really scary ones. Once you know the rules, you can break them better. I'm really happy with his pose here. The arms look great, and I finally got the tuchus in the right place for one of these poses. (Side note: "tuchus" was not in Blogger's dictionary. I had to look it up on Merriam-Webster to make sure it was spelled right. I didn't know it came from Yiddish until now.) The face took some experimenting, but I'm very happy with how I got it to look, and it didn't take too long. I also didn't have to look anything up for this drawing, which I appreciated.

God be with me. Lord save me. I love you.