New Masamune Sketch!

Hey everyone! Welcome back!

I've been a bit under the weather this week. I occasionally get flare ups in my back and I've been suffering a bit with that, making it somewhat difficult to really work on much before I've needed to move around or otherwise not sit in front of a computer for long when I'm not at work. Still, I have worked on a sketch for something later.

If you've seen a picture I drew of a character called Masamune at one point, I did another drawing of him, though at a different angle and position. The previous picture held him at a side view, whereas this one is a bit more of an angle with some perspective to it. The sketch is pretty much a work in progress and may have changes as I go along, depending on how it goes.

So, this is what the first version I ended up with:

I'm a little unsure about the angle of his body as he seems to be curved in a strange way, so this is something that will need to be fixed so his back doesn't look like its been curved into a C shape. This should be fixable by adjusting how the clothing sits and the shadows of the opening so he seems more as if he is leaning forwards instead.

The other part I'm unsure of is his hair, whether it's causing the image to seem unbalanced somehow. I'm considering switching the sides it is on, but at the same time, it does look like he had just scooted back from something (If I put dust clouds around his feet, so the hair could be at that angle from momentum.

The bandage-like socks  and the wrapping in his hair, as I possibly mentioned in the previous image, are meant to resemble the way cloth is wrapped around a sword hilt, mostly an aesthetic to combine with the fact his limbs can become blades.

This sketch also includes some faint set up lines and stuff that I had been drawing to help me with the pose a bit, though as mentioned I did screw up a bit on his actual body.

Still, though its not much, what do you all think? As always, I'm happy to hear feedback!

Until next time!

Tara

Zack The Icon!

Hey everyone! Welcome back!

So...very very annoyed with my tablet. It seems to constantly be getting stuck, even after I try to reset the pressure. If anyone has any advice on it, I'd love to hear. Or do you all think I should just give it up and go for new? please let me know as it's really causing me a lot of difficulties.

Still, I've been persevering as best I could recently while trying to work on the line art to one of the sketches I mentioned last time. Though it is very difficult when it get stuck and a small line ends up a scribble across the whole page.

Anyway, the image I was working on was the icon/avatar image of Zack (Isaac Foster) from the game 'Angels of Death'. For those who didn't read my last post, Angels of Death is a Horror RPG maker game that has a manga and an anime that recently came out based on it. Zack is one of the two main leads of the game. Its certainly interesting, if a bit on the goofy, over the top side when not touching on some fairly dark subjects. The image of Zack I did was based more on the in game design of Zack, rather than the more anime/manga version, mostly because I got so used to seeing Zack in this way rather than the anime interpretation.

In my last post, I posted a sketch that I did of Zack for the image, though I've now done line art for it in two ways. The first very simplistic, which could be used better with colour and shading, while the other is still a bit unfinished, but is to go with something more black and white, also following the simplistic designs of the in game icons.

The simple line art is this:

This line art pretty much allows me to play around with the colour and effects while showing where everything is. I am still trying to see what works for the basic flat colours - though I may have to check the anime colours if I can't find the in game ones. The colours I checked out first (if only to see if things worked) were only a starting guestimate.

Skin colour wise is a bit difficult to figure out. As a character, he is mostly bandaged due to burns, and the in game spite and icon only shows black where the skin around the eyes are. The anime had a darker skin representing the burns, but I'm not entirely sure what to go for in the colour version, so the shown skin is mostly a placeholder.  The mouth was always in the game and anime shown over the bandages. I'm not sure if it was a simplistic way of showing it without having to mess with how the wrappings work, or if its just to show the mouth under the bindings, but I'm sticking with the theme. 

Admittedly, the hair is a bit on the light side too. But it does seem to work fine in colour, assuming I can get the light and dark tones right. It'd likely look better with shading and lighting to help pick out the colours rather than them all blending together.

As mentioned, I did try another version of the line art, though its incomplete at the moment thanks to my iffy tablet. This one would work more for monochrome colouring, with the shadows being a stark black. With this one I also leaned towards the game design where the exposed skin around the eyes are concerned, making it black. This is what I have so far:

As you can see, it does make the character itself stand out more and give some depth to it, and that was with only partly done. It does need my tablet to not stick though, as I need to focus on which areas are blacked out. Small details are awkward to do with a sticking pen, so to speak.

Still, I really do want this to come out well! I may even try it with a very simple colour pallet, or in monochrome, to see if it stands out even more. Either way, tablet aside, I have been enjoying working on this version of it :)

Hopefully my tablet will be working properly again soon, but I'd still love to hear if anyone has suggestions on that front. Please let me know!

Until next time!

Tara 

Sketches! Milo and Zack!

Hey everyone! Welcome back!

So while work has been a bit on the busy side, I have been doing some sketches. Some of these are ideas based on what I mentioned last week - ie the anthropomorphic animal character, but I also couldn't help but do a little sketch based on something that caught my interest of late. More on that one later, though. Firstly, let's talk about the first lot of sketches.

So, If you didn't see last time, I had mentioned a character made that was an anthropomorphic animal, but that I hadn't done many animal characters in a while, showing one of the last few times I did as the two page short comic project I did at Uni. The character in question is an anthropomorphic raccoon by the name of Milo Forager and is basically from a story where animals are instead of humans (though that's not the main deal of the story, just as to why I've been thinking up humanoid raccoons instead of a human character design for once).

The first few sketched ideas were drawn directly in biro, but were mostly just me thinking up ideas while on break at work - apologies for the odd colouring of the scrap paper I was using.

So, these were my first iterations of Milo. Still a bit of a work in progress, but for having not drawn many animal characters recently they didn't come out too bad, though admittedly, the full body one still feels a bit stiff. Plus the markings around his face aren't particually fully matching to the animal it was based on. Even so, the design wasn't absolutely terrible, so if I could ease up the body a little more so he seemed less stiff, I'd be happy.

I did, however, try another version later on, mostly to see how he might look with markings a little closer to his actual; real life animal counterparts:

Still not quite happy with this one either. While he does look looser in body, I think his head looked a bit on the warped side - mostly just being too big for the body. But this one was mostly just an experiment on the face markings more than anything. If I do a combination of the first and second full designs, it might be something a bit more fitting.

Maybe I should try taking a pencil to work with me when sketching, so I can edit them a bit better with the power of an eraser! lol. But either way, these were fairly quick sketches that were mostly me getting used to animal characters more than anything else. A (large) work in progress, but I will persevere! I hope to be able to draw something fitting for him! If I can do that then it will certainly help with drawing other animal characters as well. Always good to keep your hand in!

The other sketch I mentioned doing was based on something that interested me of late. Recently, I've been into a game called 'Angels of Death', an RPG maker horror game which has also spawned a manga, anime and novel. I haven't yet really looked at the other iterations yet, since its always fun to see the source material in all its glory first. While its not a horror in a 'jump at your face' kind of way, it certainly becomes unsettling in places and it helps that you come to genuinely care for the main characters. I found myself a number of times feeling for them in different ways, only to be pulled up short when I remember exactly who I'm suddenly worried for. Either way, I very much enjoyed it and do hope to look at the other mediums to see how they hold up as well.

The game artwork is, from what I can see, somewhat different from the other mediums, however, having a very unique style to them which fits the unnerving undertone even when they look...kinda adorable in their own way. Whereas the clips of the anime and manga I've seen tend to lean towards more stereotypical anime/manga. Not a bad thing, of course, as it certainly fits their mediums and lets them feel a bit more 'realistic', but it is a bit odd when you got so used to character portraits to see the characters elsewhere look the same, yet different. 

The main reason I mention this is because the sketch I did of the character Zack (who you really come to like and is often the source of my cheering on and then being pulled up short remembering that he isn't exactly a hero/good guy and is a serial killer, no matter how he's the male lead.) was drawn mostly with the game in mind, rather than how he is drawn in the manga or anime. This means more cartoony/rough design.

Yes, I know his mouth is over the bandages. Why? I have no idea, but that's how he is in the portrait and elsewhere. I have a few theories on why in the game - either its so you can see his wide variety of expressions in his portraits (you'd otherwise only get his eyes and his facial expressions really do make his character), or there would be a hole in the bindings near his mouth and it was a more simplistic way of drawing him. Either way, since it was more based of his character portrait, I thought it best to go with that, whichever reason it is. 

I diiiiiid miss off one bit of his hair closer to his forehead - whoops - but that could just be explained by a gust of wind or movement (I'll be fixing it though as I do more stuff with it). The odd shaped outlines on the hood (which aren't shaded here) are actually blood splats dried on, but at the moment those are just placeholders so I know where they should be. I'm hoping to do a digital version of him as an icon, or maybe some kind of badge? not sure yet. We'll see how it goes :)

Either way, I do suggest the game. Its weird, admittedly, and unnerving rather than scary in places but as mentioned, you do learn to like the main characters in their own special ways. Its currently on Steam, but I hear its also coming to the Switch (which is...a tad odd, since I suppose I never linked such games with Nintendo consoles, considering its themes). Still, like it or not, the ride at least is interesting.

I may do more Angels of death sketches here and there in the future, too.

But anyways, until next time!

Tara

Animals! Comics! Fun!

Hey everyone! Welcome back!

First, a quick appology for the delay in this blog post. Due to illness and an important birthday - my younger brother's 21st, to be specific - my work schedule was somewhat mixed up from normal. On Monday, which I normally have a free evening and thus I blog on, I was covering for someone at work, and my usual shift today is being taken in return. Those of you who follow me on twitter will know I left a note on there, though.

(If your not following me on twitter yet @chosha_kurenai then you may want to, if only for any little updates that I might post up there in cases such as these when I get delays and stuff)

With that out of the way, on to buisness!

So, there is a character I'm drawing at the moment which is a bit different from the norm. Usually, I draw human characters - or at least humanoid ones - with the exception of the ninetailed fox I drew earlier in the year and the odd Luphin (my mascot) here and there. This character I am drawing, however, is an anthropomorphic animal. As much as I like animals, I admittedly haven't drawn many in recent times other than a couple characters from undertale (can you count Toriel as an animal-like character?) and, a few years back, a couple of fursona as sketch commissions while at conventions. Before that, the only real animal characters I've really drawn was when I was doing a two page comic as part of an assignment at university.

The comic assignment was a side project to the 'Fairy Tales' project we did, where we drew out the name of a random fairytale or fable (I got the gingerbread man) and had to make a twelve page comic of a new interpretation of said fairytale. My Gingerbread man comic ended up becoming a detective story about how a criminal code named the gingerbread man was on the run from the police and Inspector Raymond Fox was tasked to capturing him.

(I'm actually wondering about making an improved version of the comic. There was much more I could have done with it if I didn't have a 12 page limit. And could draw better and it wasn't my first attempt at digital anything)

The two page additional story however was different. What we had to do there was work with another student. One would write the concept, the other would draw it, and it had to be based on the 12 paged comic the one concepting the story made.

I'm....not entirely sure how my two pager got a tortoise and the hair race out of and exceptionally different retelling of the princess and the pea - but from what I gather both hair and tortoise were caught up in the crossfire of a fight from the twelve page one in one of the panels. This the two page comic focused on them.

I was given a very vague concept though. More a 'these are the characters.....do something with them'. As such, I made up a silly joke and ran with it. Unlike my Gingerbread man comic, it was hand drawn and I was doing an attempt at matching a different style. What I got was this:

Yes, I admit, it was a bit cheesy, but that's pretty much my humour all over :P

Anyway, other than sharing that with you guys, since it otherwise would have faded into obscurity, the point is, this was the real last time I made an anthropomorphic animal character that wasn't based on a fursona or mythology.

The character in question is more similar to the kind of animals on Zootopia (Or Zootropolis, if you're from the UK like me, which I still dont get. Zootopia sounds much better in my opinion) - that being, standing on hind legs, dressed in human clothing and fully acting like a human might. Milo Forager, the character in question, is a raccoon character, tending to wear either a lazily worn suit or sometimes shirt, trousers and a hoodie, depending on what he's doing at the time. His day job being a detective.

Thus, what I'm currently working on. I'm in the middle of sketches, full body, expressions and maybe different outfits, and I hope to be able to show you some of them when I have a pool to show you so its not just 'here, random sketch'. Depending on how he turns out, I may even think about using him in a story. We'll have to see.

I'm actually really looking forwards to working on an animal character for once! :)

Until next time!

Tara

Character Sketch: Kougeki!

Hey everyone! Welcome back!

So, between working on a commission I'm currently doing, I've also been doing some sketches of a character that I made a while ago, but never really drawn before. Partly this was more warm up type things than anything, but two that I did do I'm somewhat considering turning digital in the manner I did Huojin last month. They are both upper body shots and certainly have room for improvement, especially for details, but I do have a couple of ideas if I do end up using them.

For a bit of context though, the character I sketched here is named Kougeki. In the roleplay he was created for, he was originally one of the sub-bosses of an organisation that was meant to essentially destroy the world in an intense 'cleanse' and recreate it. For Kougeki, unlike the head and his fellow deputy, wasn't particually interested in the ethical dilemmas and such, but rather followed out of loyalty to the leader who had given him a purpose after circumstances left him without the ability to physically feel anything and being blind in one eye when it was turned into an optical weapon.

While not particually evil nor predominantly good, Kougeki is wild and unpredictable and, through the course of the story finds his own purpose and, in doing so, ends up acting as a type of antihero and ends up helping to stop the actual destruction of the world in the end, mostly since he would lose his purpose again if the world was reduced to ash rather than because he disagreed or agreed with any particular philosophy. If nothing else, he's fun to use in the roleplay, if only because of his behaviour and because he doesn't fit into the purely 'good' or 'evil' categories.

So, that said, these are the sketches and what ideas I have in mind for them.

Sketch number one is pretty much a simple portrait-like shot of Kougeki, and is sort of a cross between what I did with Huojin, and when I was doing a series of portraits of characters. It would be the less detailed of course, with it being only that, so no background involved, but it would serve as a good reference shot.

Sketch number two I sort of have an idea of doing a more 'poster like' picture of Kougeki prepping for a fight and would be interesting to see the lighting - or rather, lightening - effects. Though the photo of the sketch isn't too obvious, but Kougeki has lightning crackling around his hands and it would make for a different tone to the simple portrait. This one might even have a background to it. I have an idea of making it almost like a comic panel, depending on how it goes.

Of course, both these sketches are simple ideas more than anything, mostly to see if they work. Going forwards, the and sketches that would be the basis for the actual pictures will be a bit more detailed and more refined in placements and such. Admittedly these aren't my main priority, but I'll be updating you on them as I work on them so you can see how they're coming along.

I'll admit, I look forwards to working on sketch 2 - I've not needed to do lightning effects since I worked on the Susanoo comic! Hopefully I remember how it works. If not, then I'm sure I'll be doing research to remind me about it soon enough!

Until next time!

Tara

The Nogitsune Trio! The Update!

Hey everyone! Welcome back!

So, still mostly focused on working on the commission I mentioned last time, but I have done a bit of an update to the Nogitsune Trio that I had been working on before I received the commission, enough of an update to let you guys see what's going on.

Last time I had drawn the line art....but I wasn't particually happy with it due to the hair feeling too solid or in clumps so large it looked more link bunches of bananas than hair, so I used that line art as the clean sketch for the updated version. What I have using that is this:

As you can see, the hair does look less clumped and the ends do seem as though there were bits of hair rather than a solid structure compared to the previous version. I also made slight changes to some of the masks, mostly Uta's and Nagisa's where the eye-holes are concerned. I am contemplating that I might have their eyes peeking through the masks in the shadows at some point, but that is something to experiment with later, depending on if it would complicate the image.

Beyond that, I also did the flat colours for the image, which, if nothing else, helped to seperate the characters from each other, and also allowed me to work out where the kanji will be. I've got placeholders for now, but I'll be attempting to do a stylised version one the main image is finished. 

As you can see, the characters do stand out a lot more from each other, especially since they do favour certain colours. For those unsure, Itazura is the red, Nagisa the blue and Uta the purple. Speaking of Uta, I did later realise her neck was way too thin and fixed it before I finished the flat colour, so it might not fully match the line art from above.

Something I wanted to try was to have a parchment feel to the background, which might fit more once the kanji is less obviously typed, and also would make it look almost like a play on old style pictures without fully being that style. I'm hoping that the textures wont be too out of place, as Uta's mask needs to have wood patterns on it as the 'unique' pattern that would be her calling card, so to speak. As mentioned in a past blog about the family, they are all shapeshifters, which means the masks acts as their 'face' so they can identify each other no matter what appearence they currently have. This at least should make the mask a bit more interesting to look at, as it is very simplistic in comparison to Nagisa and Itazura's.

I'll admit, though, I have a lot of fun with Itazura's mask. Its probebly the most fitting for his temperament. lol.

Admittedly the thing I'm most dreading is hand writing the Kanji. I'm not a native Japanese speaker, nor have I had formal tuition, so I'm terrified I'm going to mess it up. But I'll do my best! Though if anyone has any tips for writing in Japanese or knows where I should look for help on their, I'd love to hear from you!

Until next time!

Tara

More Doodles! :)

Hey everyone! Welcome back!

I'm currently in the middle of sketching ideas for the commission I mentioned briefly last week so I'm afraid I can't show much in terms of those just yet, especially since I'd like to at least show them to the one who commissioned me in the first place. Due to that I'll admit I've not really worked on my Nogitsune picture either.

However, I have done a few doodles that you guys might be interested in looking at, since they are to do with the Nogitsune Trio - mainly I was sketching ideas for full body pictures, kind of how I did in the past with Nagisa. Admittedly they are pretty rough, as they were drawn in pen, but most of it was getting a general feel for them. I am hoping to translate them into digital versions at some point, and in doing so fixing a few errors. For now though, thought I'd let you see what my initial ideas are.

So, firstly, Itazura:

Firstly, yes, that arm is the main issue with this picture. I was actually unsure what position to have the arm ad somehow it got....stretched? Either way, its certainly disproportioned and will definitely be changed in the final image. I was contemplating if, like Nagisa, he should be messing around with blue fire or something else. One idea I di have is having the final image with one of the foxes that he uses as helpers, perhaps over his shoulder so he is absently stroking it. But it is just a thought at the moment. All depends on if I can draw a good fox to add in later (I hope I can, I do like foxes, though its been a long time since I drew a normal sized, non-magical one. lol)

Next was Uta:

With Uta being a child I sort of wanted her to look a tad more playful, though it sort of looks like she either is playing some odd game of hopscotch, is jumping over skipping rope two other people off screen are waving around or she jumped off a low wall. Either way, it works. lol. I just knew with Uta that I didn't want her just standing there posing like Nagisa and Itazura, if only because she's a lot younger, being ten rather than a full grown adult.

Out of the two, I think I like how Uta came out better. I might experiment with Itazura's pose just a bit more - I'm not quite sure if it show off his confidence in quite the right manner, so you may see other Itazura poses in the future, but I think I can work best with the Uta sketch into full digital glory. Of course, if anyone has any thoughts on the matter, please let me know :)

Until next time!

Tara