Random Stuff!

Hey everyone! Welcome back!

So, I'll admit I've been a little busy this week with work and planning out part two of Dreamwalkers, but since I can't really show any of the sketched comic images without spoiling things right now, I thought I should show you a few other things I've been working on in the meantime. It's not quite the same, I know, but I hope it'll be interesting anyway :)

So, the first thing was something of an experiment in inking and also in doing more fine details, such as doing hair. My usual style is, admittedly, a little more simplistic where hair is concerned, and admittedly, I was a little unsure how it would come out. While the image is currently unfinished, this is what I have so far:

It looks a tad weird when its unfinished, especially since it looks like there are horns growing out of the character's back right now (Spoilers: they aren't horns, just something unfinished. lol), but I have to admit that the hair did come out quite well. Though admittedly, it did take me a while. I started by drawing the outlines of where the hair would flow, before adding in the shadows/inking to each section individually.

Admittedly, this likely isn't the most productive manner to do this in comics, and there is probably more efficient ways, but I'll admit that I prefer to experiment a bit before I actually look up tutorials. Again, its a bit of a weird way of doing things, but I am a bit weird. I guess its just it feels easier to adapt tutorials into whatever I learned from my experimentation, rather than trying to use tutorials and then trying to experiment with them when I've now got a full 'this is how you do it' in my head.

But that;'s just me, and I know I'm odd. lol

Either way, I'm quite pleased with how its turning out so far, and I hope that the trend continues as I work on it more. There is still a lot to do. Like finishing the armour, the wings, and....well, the lower body.

Still, this isn't the only think I've been working on. I've also been asked to do a continuation of a tattoo that I did last year. This time, I've been asked to make a pocket watch over a cracked part of skin, which will have words underneath, with various words such as freedom and liberty, etc. There is also going to be a broken chain coming from the pocket watch.

This is currently my progress on that.

 Have I ever mentioned before that drawing circles by hand is difficult for me? Still, it's not as bad as it could be, right? I didn't want to rely on the circle tool, especially since I'll have to work on thicknesses on certain sides of the circle and such. I do think that what will take the most time, though, is the cogs on the inside of the clock. There is a lot of detail there after all, and one of the requirements I was given was to have a pocket watch that showed those cogs in the middle. Still, I'll persevere! I do hope the rest of it will work out, though, as I want it to go well. It is for a client after all. Hopefully, once I'm done I can show the final result and how the client liked it too :)

That's all from me for now!

Until next time!

Tara

Somnus Oneirology Specialists

Hey everyone! Welcome back!

Today, I thought I would talk a little about something I've mentioned in a few of my posts about my comic, Dreamwalkers. That is, the group known as S.O.S, which the central plot revolves around. As mentioned, S.O.S, in this case, rather than the usual Save Our Souls meaning, stands for Somnus Oneirology Specialists.

Now, as you probably know from any of my previous posts, Somnus refers to one of the main characters and founders of this group, and I'm sure I don't need to explain the 'specialist' part. However, Oneirology, the middle part of this version of S.O.S, is not a standard word that everyone uses day to day. However, it's not a made up word. Oneirology comes from the Greek 'Oneiron', meaning 'dream', and 'Logia', meaning 'The Study of'. As such, the word Oneirology translates to 'The Study of Dreams'.

According to Wikipedia and similar sources, Onreiology researches the connection between dreams and known brain functions, the mechanisms of dreaming, how dreams can be influenced, as well as how the brain works in dreaming pertaining to memory formation and mental disorders. The aim is to study the process of dreams, rather than analysing the meaning behind them, so Onreiology is a completely different study than that of Dream Interpretation.

Considering that the creatures that Dreamwalkers revolves around, the Onreios, effect dreams on a physical level, enough that it can change brain functions to essentially kill the dreamer from their own dreams, Oneirology fit far more than dream interpretation. That is not to say that some dream interpretation couldn't be added to the specific dreams that each victim might have during the series, but the Dreamwalkers are mainly looking at brain function during the sleeping states of the victims to monitor their state and locate and classify the Oneiros, which is far closer to Oneirology.

In the story, S.O.S is meant to be a legitimate business. A character whom has yet to be introduced, is actually trained in Dreamology, and as such, they can still earn a living, even when an Oneiros-inflicted victim isn't the one walking through the doors, but as mentioned before, Oneirology in this case can only locate and classify the Oneiros. Now, you may be wondering where the 'Dreamwalking' is involved.

Using the Oneirology as a basis, the Dreamwalkers are then capable of traversing the dream on a conscious basis in order to neutralise the supernatural threat. Now, while Dreamwalkers on the level of this story might not exist, there are such things as people who are fully conscious of the fact they are dreaming, and are even capable of influencing their dreaming actions to a degree. This is referred to a Lucid Dreaming, and is the basis of the idea of Dreamwalking, and thus the basis of the idea for those characters that are capable of hopping into people's dreams. It is certainly an interesting idea that you could have this much control over your dreaming self, and certainly opens up interesting story related doors, especially since the trope of 'everything is a dream' is used less as a twist ending, and more as the premise you already know, but doesn't act as a buffer. Rather, the fact that everything is a dream is actually the reason things are so deadly during the waking parts of the story, where it is now 'real life'.

So, the S.O.S team essentially blend real studies with the supernatural aspect of the story to create the events that Dreamwalkers works around.

Still, I am interested in exploring the ideas of dream interpretations as well. After all, there are characters that only appear for a single case, so the fact that you could divine information about them due to the kind of dream they are having seems an interesting way of developing characters in this universe, if only slightly. Of course, relying only on that would make things very open to interpretation in some cases, so regular story telling applies as well, but since comics and manga are a visual medium, it certainly peeked my interest.

The world of dreams and its studies are certainly interesting ones!

Until next time!

Tara

Speed Sketching

 Hey everyone! Welcome back!

So, I've been doing a few things recently. I've been rather busy at my day job, so I haven't really been able to focus on Dreamwalkers much. But I do have some news! I'm going to be going to New Work Comic Con! Not selling anything, unfortunately (maybe one day once there are lots more volumes of the comics done and there is more of a following. Tis a goal!) but it'll actually be my first time attending a con abroad. And considering that it's likely to be even bigger than London, I'm really excited to see how things are done over there. My ticket arrived in the post yesterday, so I'm really hyped now. Less than a month to go!

I'll definitely be giving my impressions of it once I return, but I'll talk about that more a bit closer to the time.

In the meantime, I've just been working on a few random things. Firstly, I was working on creating a portfolio picture for a Naruto OC I made a while ago. I'm going to be creating a full version including different angle shots, different clothing types etc. If the final version goes well, its my intention to do something like that for the Dreamwalker characters as well too. But as its not too important, I've only been working on this version on and off. While all the angles have been sketched out so far, I've only got one of the full body drawings finished.

It's certainly been interesting doing this, so I think it'll be fun to be able to do such things with the Dreamwalker cast, especially considering the interesting clothing styles that Somnus and Ashling tend to favour.

As well as slowly working on that in spare time, I've also been seeuing just how fast I can do sketch/colour drawings. They certainly aren't neat, of course, but I'm mostly using them as warm ups to keep my hand in while I've been busy with my day job (I don't work set hours, so they can change weekly. Normally I have more time to work on my comics). As said, not neat, but they have been quite fun. These are a few of my quick five/ten minute sketches:

Not all of them came out brilliantly of course, especially since I was limiting myself to five to ten minutes to draw and colour as best I could. These two were some of my favourites, but it was fun just messing around, sketching whatever I felt like and just keeping practicing until I can really get back on track again. If nothing else, it was just fun trying out different styles, even if they are only in sketched form. Hopefully, I'll be able to show some more things soon too! It'll be interesting to see what might inspire me next. :)

Until next time!

Tara

The Antagonists

Hiya everyone! Welcome back!

So, I did a ten facts list on the three main characters the last few weeks. Today, I thought I would talk a little about the main antagonistic force in Dreamwalkers, which I had mentioned briefly in past posts. The antagonists are referred to as the Onreios.

The word 'Onreios' is actually from the Greek mythological entities referred to as 'Onreioi'. In the Greek mythology, the Onreioi are the offspring of the goddess of night, Nyx, and the siblings of Thanatos (god of death), Hypnos (god of sleep) and Geras (god of old age). They were said to be the personification of dreams and took the appearance of black winged daemons. These came to be the inspiration of the Onreios, who are beings that are the personification of monstrous nightmares that the S.O.S team have to hunt down within the dreamscape. The name also comes from the word Onreiology, which is another word for Dreamology.

Here are a few of my initial concepts for the Onreios:

I had planned for the Onreios to come in different shapes and sizes, depending on things people might fear, so I practiced with a lot of different sketches, some of which might even be used in a fashion later on. Things that look shadow, unnatural and out of place certainly seemed fitting. A style I chose for the final design of the Onreios that appear in the first chapter I decided to look into more human-like features, such as a humanoid skull-like face, but warped and changed. Something I found was that the closer things look to human, the more unnatural they can sometimes appear. Of course, the additional features added to it also help too. Still, if only to make it interesting, each Onreios that appear in each cake will be unique in their own ways.

I'm considering at the end of each case doing a little Onreios file at the end, giving a bit of information about the creature involved with the case.

There is more involved where the Onreios are concerned, including a ranking system, hierarchy and more, but as it's not yet appeared in the comic itself, I'll bring up that at a later time. Something to look forwards to as the team and the readers learn more themselves. Still, there is a lot of info on the Onreioi online, if anyone wants more information on the inspiration for the Onreios. It is an interesting read, since they aren't the most well known of Greek myths.

I'll very likely make more concepts for different Onreios as the series goes on, so keep an eye out for those too :)

Until next time!

Tara