Return of the portraits!

Hey Everyone! Welcome back!

So, my wrist is still not exactly up to par, but I have been doing things that I can still do, despite this - that is to say sketches, line art and flat colour, with the actual shading left until my wrist is feeling a little better to work on the finer details.

Since a lot of things I've been working on of late have been full body images, I thought I would work on my portrait project again, this time with another character, a somewhat innocent, fluffy haired character of mine with a few odd quirks to him named Mugyou Koe. As a character, he is a little shy and awkward about people, but is also capable of sensing a person through sounds only he can hear. His interesting quirk is that he tends to refer to people by the sounds he hears, rather than their actual names. For example he calls one friend 'Rain' and another 'River' because that is what their 'energies' sound like to him.

For this portrait, I did the base sketch in my sketch book rather than digitally, if only so I don't lose the ability to do so. While digital is great for correcting mistakes, it would just be a bit lazy to think I could so easily correct a miss-drawn line. It helps somewhat to keep my hand steady if I know I can't correct a mistake with a simple mouse click or short cut. As such, I ended up with this:

Admittedly, he looks a little more effeminate than I originally considered for him, but in combination with his personality, it seemed quite fitting for him. Admittedly I think I enjoyed sketching his hair. It just looks so fluffy! As such, I really couldn't bring myself to make him more manly. Not to mention I kind of drew this directly in biro, anyway, so.....Sorry, Koe, you are now doomed to androgyny! 

With the sketch done, I then photographed it, uploaded it to my computer (because unfortunately I lost the instructions to connect my new laptop to my scanner at the moment) and then worked from that photograph, adjusting the size so he better fit the digital page. In the end, line art and flat colour done, he looks like this:

I think he has come out quite well so far. Along with my images of Arashi and Shinta, I think this is one of my favourite portraits so far. Of course, the shading would finalise that decision, but that, unfortunately, is something that will have to wait until my wrist is back in working order - main problem when you have wrist problems, they seem to take forever to leave. *Sigh*

Well, I think if I didn't do at least a little in way of drawings, I'd get bored. lol! But anyway, hopefully I'll be able to finish off some of these pictures properly soon enough. Wish my wrist well and lets hope that time is fast approaching, yeah?

Until next time!

Tara

Doodle Me This

Hey Everyone! Welcome back!

So, admittedly, most of this week I've been trying to get back into the swing of things after my holiday. A week hasn't particularly helped me in terms of my wrist, honestly, but I've been doing my best to at least do something, if only to keep my wrists in some kind of active condition. Keep my hand in, so to speak (Pun fully intended).

As such, I started doing the line art and flats for a character. While I haven't completed what I had in mind with the Aster images yet - the careful details for shadows seems to effect my wrist more than the line art part, oddly - those will come when I'm back in the swing of things. This character that I did was for a forum I frequent (and mentioned before), so at the very least it will help towards the archiving of the characters. It also helps me to get used to sketching on a computer as well. While I'm improving there, it is still a tad jarring to me to have to co-ordinate my hand on my tablet to what's going on the screen

As such, my character sketch ended up as such:

As usual, it seems that feet will always be something I have to do a few times before I'm pleased with them. Mainly why in the sketch it is a different colour. Other than that foot, I was rather pleased with how the sketch came out. If I coloured the foot right (an easy enough adjustment to make if this was for a paid sketch) and removed the bit from the original foot, it would be pretty decent. :)

As it is, I used this sketch to make the line art and flat colour for the character itself, creating this:

There is still a lot of detail that I would need to put in on the light and shading stage, of course, but for flat colour I felt that it came out rather well, if a little green. While admittedly there was a reason for this, perhaps I should study up a little more on colour theory to help make them a tad more....uh....colourful? Still, green as a colour is considered somewhat neutral in meaning, and this character is indeed rather neutral, avoiding fights and ties, generally drifting about life. He certainly comes across as laid back, at least to me, with his slouched posture and half lidded eyes.

As a newer character in my ever growing collection, I wasn't entirely sure if I had a good enough grasp of his personality to really give him justice. However, I think it came out much better than I could have hoped. Now, whether or not the final product will be just as good.....well, we'll have to see once my tendonitis has eased off a bit more.

Sorry that there wasn't much to show on this one, but hopefully you enjoyed it nonetheless.

Until next time!

Tara 

Look Who's Back!

Hey everyone! Welcome back!

Or should that be a welcome back to me after my week hiatus? Yup, I was on my holidays and unable to post last week, but I have now returned and posts will be back to normal again :)

If you've been following me on my twitter page, you may have seen a few of my holiday posts of amusing things I may have seen, though I went quieter towards the end of the holidays. That's mainly so I'd have stuff to actually talk about here, since I was having a short break from art as well to give my wrists a bit of a break, too. Hopefully this way I wont be repeating myself too much

So, I didn't go abroad or anything for my holiday, but rather I went to somewhere I've been quite a few times, but it's been years since I was actually there, especially in the summer months. Where? Well, I was in Blackpool. Admittedly I know most of the front of Blackpool like the back of my hand at this point, considering we used to go there almost every year to see the illuminations, but I think the last time I went during summer was.......I'm not sure. I might have still been a teenager, to be honest. Considering I turned 29 last week, that has to say something. lol. Still, even though I have been to Blackpool quite a bit, it was still interesting to see the various changes and just how it could be during summer (and for my Birthday, too!)

Also, apologies in advance for any poor quality photographs. I'm not much of a photographer, using my phone or not, but anyway!

We stayed at the Imperial Hotel, which was about ten minutes walk north of the North Pier, which prides itself on its historical roots, including famous people having used the place in the past, including presidents like Churchill and Thatcher (there were others as well, but I'll admit that my memory is pretty bad and I don't recall everyone). Several of the rooms even had names attached to them if they were used, such as the 'President Suite' or 'Princess Suite'. The hotel was even used as a kind of respite hospital at one point for soldiers who suffered shell shock. So it's got quite a bit of history behind it, which the rep was eager to tell everyone about. I probably would have minded a little less if staying after the first meal there to sing war songs I don't know the words to in a room that, while historical, had no air flow once the doors was closed wasn't compulsory.  We did end up having to leave part way through the after meal entertainment, though, unless we wanted to pass out from the heat.

Still, despite the iffy start, the rest of the time there was nice. The food was great, the rooms were nice and we didn't feel particularly rushed - which was probably a good thing, as it was fairly easy to get lost in. Thankfully, my room was on the first floor, so I only had to go around a corner and down some stairs. I did have to direct a few people in the right direction when I was crossing paths with them before. Still, I did like the hotel. There was even a pool, though I only got to use it once. I'd like to try it and the beauty treatments they had on offer there, too, should I go again. As it was, this time we were pretty busy.

On average, we walked about 9 miles a day, give or take (those fitbits are pretty helpful in figuring out that, give or take any walking up and down stairs or moving about the room). Since we went there via coach, we couldn't drive and we only went by tram one day when we were offered tickets as part of the coach holiday deal, essentially giving us a day of free tram usage. Still, it never really felt we were walking that much, if only because there was interesting things to see, but you could certainly tell you covered distance since we did on more than one occasion walk all the way to the south pier and back as well as wandering shops or stopping to watch the sea and seagulls doing silly things.

(Watching a girl teasing seagulls with crisps, only to have one swoop in and steal the lot was quite funny to see)

Speaking of funny, I did see a few amusing things, such as people not quite watching their own displays:

To takeaways either having a great sense of humour, or I'd wandered on some very strange coincidence:

(Note that these two were literally across the street from each other. Since Mario's also has the game character's image on the lower parts of the windows, I'm going to assume at least one of these two was in on the joke)

I even saw a scrolling display that was talking about a match (Rugby, maybe?) which was verses 'Wolverhampotn' instead of Wolverhampton. Unfortunately, that was on a day we were using the trams, so I couldn't get a picture of that before the tram had gone passed it. Still, I saw that quite late into the day, so it seemed no one had told them that they had a typo. Oh well.

Speaking of trams, most of them are now upgraded from the last time I went, looking more like trains than trams, though there were a few they now refer to as 'vintage', which still ran occasionally. It was nice to see them go past, if only because it wouldn't feel like Blackpool without at least one of them going by. While the vintage trams didn't run as often as the newer ones, it was nice to see them running fairly regularly, and the passes we could get could also work on the busses as well. They definitely made things seem far less run down than they had seemed when I last came to Blackpool, so that was nice. Admittedly the North Pier did look a bit on the decrepit side, but from what we could see, they're starting an overall on there, too, having already laid down some new flooring, doing paint work, updating the benches - I even noticed a helter skelter appeared there on the last day I was there. Who knows, maybe next time they'll have finished the refurbishments. It'll be nice to see that pier being used more often, to be honest. I know in more recent years they had done up the front of Blackpool, including a section of floor in front of the tower that has comedian's jokes and quotes of those who performed and modern art in different places. Stuff like this:

(I probably picked the wrong time to take these pictures for the last two. It was after I did it that a cleaner came to wash this off so it wasn't so dirty. lol, but being close to the sea and sand, it likely needs cleaning a looooot. lol)

There was lots more that I did as well, but talking about everything in one post would probably take an extremely long time. Still, I do have many unused photos as well, so I'll see about posting those on twitter or maybe even in another post, depending on how busy my schedule gets and if I get much done in way of art. It all depends on if my wrists are good to go again, or if they are still twinging a bit.

But for now, until next time!

Tara

Attack on Tech

Hey guys! Welcome back!

Sooooo, I have a confession to make - I really didn't get all that much done last week. Not through lack of trying, mind, but rather because it seemed that all the tech I own decided to start a rebellion last week - four things solely computer based, and one based around my phone. If you were with me last week, I mentioned on the blog then about the first of my issues (One thankfully resolved now! Yay!) and honestly it just kept on going from there. If it wasn't my email deciding to try out a new beta, yet highly glitches interface that no one could work out how to turn to the older version yet stopped you reading most of your emails, then it was the computer help I went to accidentally deleting important software from my computer when trying to fix what I later found out was a problem that could be dealt with in five minutes, now turning into an all day job to put said files back on my computer.

Suffice to say, we were not amused.

That in mind, I haven't actually finished any of the ideas I started with, though I thankfully managed to at least do the flats to a new character idea. So, my woes about technology aside, say hello to Aster Fontaine!

Aster is a character who can be seen as ambiguous, and is known to be non-binary, but there is likely some clues as to their birth gender in there. The picture does look somewhat unfinished, though, not only because of it being only in flats, but......because its actually missing some background as well. Aster is a mage character, though from a somewhat modern setting. It is my intention to show them wielding their power somewhat, hence the pose, but, of course, due to my technical issues, I didn't get around to that just yet. It is also my intention to show them in an alternate outfit as well, so the base sketch is fairly loose while I try to work out their clothing from that point as well. Depending on how things go and just how much detail into the powers and world that Aster comes from will depend on just how long the full picture will take, however.

I have been told by a friend that my colour coordination is still very avatar-ish....though in this case its just because I really like blue *Blushes*. To be fair, it wasn't exactly intentional, but it just seemed to suite Aster somewhat. Though admittedly an alternative colour idea was something more purplish to match their name. Ah well, perhaps I'll do a third alternative outfit and see how that goes too?

Oh! On another note, I'll be going on holiday next week for a short break, and I'm unsure how much wifi access I'll have, so its likely that, if I make a blog post for next week, it'll be later than my usual time. On the plus side, though, I will have my (thankfully now working) phone with me, so I'll do my best to keep you all up to date on any of my shenanigans through my twitter @chosha_kurenai, so hopefully that will tide you over until my return! :)

I'll also be sure to make my next blog post an interesting one, too.

Until next time!

Tara

Meet the New Guys!

Hey everyone! Welcome back!

You know, I've been in a biiiiit of a bind. My laptop's touchpad suddenly stopped working. In the middle of typing as well! Thankfully I have my trusty tablet to act as a mouse, but....well, I'm not entirely sure what to do about it. It certainly makes typing rather awkward on some apps, since it seems convinced that I want to draw rather than type. So with that in mind, I may end up being without a computer for a while if its something to do with the hard drive and not a software issue. Assuming I don't just settle for a USB mouse instead.

That being said, my overall ability to do art hasn't been effected, so I do have a couple of things I can share with you today that I've worked on over this week. So, the first was a character I had actually made a while ago, but had recently given an upgrade and a spruce up into digital. He is also a character that, like Ankoku last week, I did entirely digitally.

The sketch ended up being far more clean and how I wanted it than with Ankoku as well, resulting in a fairly simple base sketch:

The actual line art to it didn't end up adding all that much in comparison, though it certainly cleaned up the sketchy lines and added colour to him. The only bit I was truly unsure of what I would do with was that crystal floating over his hand, as I was unsure if it would continue to do so, or if I was going to have it laying in his palm instead. Due to that, I ignored the crystal part at that time and instead worked on my line art and colour, only adding in the crystal later when I thought it might fit either of my thoughts.

So, this is Ichimatsu!

As usual, the better quality version can be found on my DA Page, so feel free to give it a looksy! :)

I actually really enjoyed drawing Ichimatsu, and for once its not just because the hair was fun. lol. In fact, I think out of my most recent full bodied images, this one ended up as my favourite. I will admit though that the crystal did give me a little trouble. That in mind it is something I should look up on more in how to draw. If I can get it right, it could make for some interesting backgrounds and such, especially considering what some of the dream worlds in Dreamwalkers could be like.

That being said, my second character ended up utilising an element I have only recently been experimenting with - fire. Specifically dark fire, though, which I already had an idea would end up even more difficult in comparison to the blue fire I used in the Nogitsune picture I did.

Unlike the previous image, this started life as a random sketch I did during a break at work.

As you can see, it was rather rough, especially in his expression, but this ended up the basics of what the character Shingetsu would look like. I was hoping that his semi-floating appearance would be interesting to make a couple of dark flames hovering around him as well. So, I went forth to do my digital version when I wasn't at work :) and Shingetsu ended up like this:

Of course, for better quality version, usual rules apply

Admittedly, a friend joked to me that it seems that I seem to have learned what colours fit together from Avatar: The Last Airbender...lol! But considering his dark fire abilities...Well, at least I chose fitting colours, no matter how much by accident. On the note of his fire, though....Eh, I have mixed feelings. It didn't come out as well as Nogitsune's blue fire, but if I can find a way to perfect my technique a bit more, its possible that I can make those neater at least. For now, though, I suppose I could always pretend dark flames give off a lot of smoke. lol.

I'll admit I have no particular set plans for who or what I might draw for next time. It will all depend on what I need to do to fix my laptop's current issues. I will, however, do my best to try and do something interesting for you guys, though, so please look forwards to it!

Until then!

Tara

New Character: Ankoku

Hey Everyone! Welcome back!

This week has been a bit all over the place for me. But despite all that, I did manage to get a character design done, and am planning out a few more, mainly where positions are concerned, since I'm doing my best to get used to different actions again.

The first thing I did was a female character who I call Ankoku. The name one of the words for Shadow, specifically word associated with gloom, blackness, darkness or obscurity. The character themselves has the power over a type of shadow magic, allowing them to create 'solid shadows' that can be used in a variety of ways. The dress that they wear is one of these in the story she is used in, though she does eventually change to a normal black dress.

Her hair style originally belonged to Mizuki in the Pandora Comic, but as said comic is getting a style update, including eventual hair style change, I saw no reason not to recycle it to here.

The image of Ankoku was actually done entirely digitally, which is somewhat new for me. I admittedly do prefer to use a regular pencil/pen and paper for my base sketches. However, I thought that, especially if anyone ever wants sketched digital commissions, I should get the hang of doing that as well. 

Where digital sketches are concerned, I did it more in bits than I might do it when drawing it traditionally, starting with a skeleton of lines and circles, then a basic body shape, then adding the clothing and hair to it, before finally adding the details that would become the final base sketch for me to work from. The final sketch ended up looking like this:

As you can see, its…..well, very rough as I wasn't entirely sure what I wanted to do with it. Not to mention her head looks a bit broken.

(note that this is actually a collection of the sketches on all layers put together. I thought you guys might be interested to see some of my thought process that I went through, which is why this sketch in particular looks so all over the place, rather than a final sketch that would be exactly what I would refine into the true line art. Especially when you compare it to what I end up with when I finish. Hope this helps to see a tiny glimps into my very strange little mind! :D)

Thankfully, with it being digital, I could work on it a bit more, adjusting the head position, etc. What I ended up doing was actually completing the head on its own before the rest of the sketch. With that done, I then adjusted the head position, so that it no longer looked broken on her neck. That done, I then continued with the rest of the digital art, deciding what to do with the right arm that I had been struggling with and finally ended up with this complete image:

As usual, the full, higher definition image is over on me DA page, so go check it out there :)

All in all, Ankoku herself came out pretty well, though, admittedly, her dress could have been better. I wasn't entirely sure if I wanted the dress to be made of her shadows or if it was a normal dress. In the end, I went with 'normal dress' until I could decide how better to show the 'shadow' aspect to it. Though it did leave her dress very….uh….floaty? Lets just say its really light material and she spun around really fast! Lol

As mentioned, I have been working on a few other things, mainly positions and the likes, but next week I should have even more character designs to show you guys. I hope that you'll enjoy!

Until next time!

Tara

Full Bodied!

Hey everyone! Welcome back!

I know that in recent times I've been rather focused on those portraits of characters that it almost seems like I never do actual character pictures, head to toe any longer. Well, I decided to change that up a bit and do a few full body character pictures. I also did another slight experiment too, but more on that later. Firstly, about the two characters I ended up drawing, Nui and Nogitsune.

So first, Nui. With Nui, I started off with a pencil and pen sketch (which is what I normally do, even with my digital pictures. It makes for a steadier hand for me)

So, despite the slightly Japanese name, Nui was actually not based on anything Japanese at all. The name was actually a bit on an in joke that just ended up sticking. Rather, Nui is from a more fantasy based story, and, if you catch the very tiny detail, it might be obvious that Nui is also not quite human.

I thought that the sketch came out quite well. The only thing that really bothered me about it was that foot. I swear it looks broken, but for some reason I couldn't fix it on the sketch (before I added the pen, that is), but since I was going to do the rest digitally, I thought I would have a bit more room to play around with it and deal with the perspective issue, so the poor character wouldn't have to suffer a broken limb. As such, I moved onto the digital stage! 

As you might notice, he no longer has a broken ankle! Huzzah! Though admittedly I did have a bit of a time getting the perfective on it. It is still a bit more flexible than his foot....probably should be, but it at least no longer looks like its being held together by boot leather alone.

If you want to see the full version of him in higher definition, check it out over on my DA here.

I think my favourite bits to draw on him was his hair and his sash. Both I think came out pretty good. The only bit I'm not sure about on the hair is that cowlick. It feels a tad bit too far back. Otherwise, it came out pretty well.

The next pic I did was one that also had something of an experiment in it. But firstly, lets actually talk about Nagisa themselves.

So, Nogitsune Nagisa is, in fact, a character I have drawn before, in.....mostly full body (Mostly cause their feet were hidden due to their clothes. I actually did a blog post about it a while back, in fact). But, as said, some bits were missing, and it was more to showcase their face, which is rarely actually shown in the story. In fact, the fox mask on that picture is more often seen as their 'face'. As such, I decided to do a full body of them with the mask on. As I had drawn Nagisa from the front before, this time I did a slightly different angle to show the character's nature somewhat as being somewhat secretive. So showing them looking over the shoulder from behind seemed a good idea to me. 

That said, this was how my sketch turned out:

There were a few things I wasn't sure about here. The first was their hand that is near their mask. The second was less where it was and more what it was. The hand placement seemed awkward, but as I drew this directly in biro, I didn't have the option to adjust it until it hit digital. The last was actually because it was digital that I worried. I've.....never actually drawn fire digitally before. It might not be too much of a surprise, since that element hasn't come up for me in the last few years since I picked up a tablet.

Of course, there are tutorials online, so I thought it wouldn't be too bad.

....Uh....I thought. It might have just been that I wasn't typing the correct words in a search engine, or I just couldn't find what settings I needed, but I just couldn't find a fire tutorial that worked on Clip Studio Paint. I found some for photoshop, but unless the keys needed were under a different name I couldn't find them for the life of me. As such, I had to experiment to make the blue fire I needed for my pic. So, what did I end up with?

Here:

It's a bit hard to see at lower resolution on a white background, so here is a link to where it is on deviantart, where the fire is a bit easier to make out.

As you can see, I fixed the hand into a different position. As for the fire, essentially what I did was make a blob of colour, use the finger smudge tool, then on another layer, with add glow, do the same, then repeat a third time with a smaller blob. I actually thought it came out pretty well for a first attempt ever at doing fire I an experimental manner at that. Of course, if anyone has any pro tips for it I'd love for the advice!

The fire was pretty fun to do. But one again, my fave part was the hair. I'm really starting to have fun with it now I have a new way of doing it. It doesn't seem as flat as hair used to look on my pics. I'll admit though, that Nogitsune Nagisa is one of my favourate characters to draw. They're just so.....flowy. lol

Anyway, that's all from me for now. I'm going to do a few more full bodies to go with my portraits to give some variation in my pics, so I hope you enjoy them!

Until next time!

Tara