ODE TO MY VIDEO CARD

I think my PC's video card is fried which is kind of a huge pain because my baby's using obsolete AGP cards. I... Might want to build a new computer... But my 6 year-old PC runs fine otherwise <3<3<3 Drawing that comic on my Crapintosh--I mean Mactop--was painful. Flash is as fast as a dead squirrel and the damn thing is not compatible with my scanner or printer, and basically sucks in general. (I am very anti-mac if you couldn't tell.)

brb cleaving things with axe in a fit of rage

Dodged a bullet! Found and tested some old parts, and the monitor's on the fritz! Not the video card! I'm never too good with Occam's Razor. TIME FOR A SWEET NEW MONITOR.


Excellent plan, Simmons! Invite 'em to dinner and shoot 'em in the back! Classic holiday "gotcha!"

Hurf durf

"Oh, airship parts can fuel a decent fire. How lovely! " VanLande takes a seat on her scavenged armchair, opens her novel, and flips to the page she left off at--page eighty-five. "Warrick, when you're done collecting the ship's engine, please brew me a cup of tea. I am parched, my friend, dreadfully thirsty!"



Quick and crappy sketch of a possible scenario for the film. It'll make sense later when it's not a bunch of lines, hurr. Gonna flesh it out in Photoshop or something, that's the plan.

VanLande remains calm when she crashes ships. Warrick, however, does not. And usually ends up leaking coolant everywhere...


Spider Jerusalem: cheap, but not as cheap as your girlfriend.

BOTTOM OF THE BARREL, OH GOD WHY

Work has been crazy busy for the past month and a half. I go home covered in paint and dust every night. I somehow split the soles of my last two pairs of boots... My poor babies! D: You will be missed.

Needless to say, I haven't had time to draw or animate. I did, however, have a brilliant set idea for that animation I keep mentioning.



Sup concrete facility. I haven't fully scoped out the place or talked to the management, but it seemed like a good idea at the time. Could make for some interesting outside shots if it actually goes through. All the metal seemed too appropriate.

Also, the street it's on looks like something out of Silent Hill during foggy days. Quite epic.

Here, have some failed spaulders for a costume. One unsanded, one sanded. Wonderflex and Plasti-paste. Think I'll slush cast them instead. Or fiberglass. Eh.




I just got a big bag of red moleskin in the mail, so I'm going to go roll around in it and then sew some pants! BOOSH!


Where is Babar?
- He-He's taking a shower, buddy.
Elephants shower with their nose! BRRRRRRR!
- Nearl... I'm gonna kill Babar.

GO FOR WALKIES.

Uh, a walk cycle not even 1/3 done? Haven't even completed the cycle itself. Basic outline that I've been poking at every now and then for the past week and a half or something. She'll have her cane in her crooked arm and kind of strut when I'm done. That's the goal at least.






I'm pushing buttons, I'll do a dance
With my skivvies on outside my pants

COEUR

Really quick post. Gonna chug some Nyquil and conk out afterwards. ...Or wait for the Warhammer MMO to finish downloading. Dwarf tank, awww yeeeah.

Massart representin' at Ottawa! And Kara totally owned at awards night with her film. Fabulous stuff, go look!

So I always get back from Ottawa feeling totally inspired and needing to make stuff. This time I'll actually do it because I'm sick of being lazy. So far I hit the ground running. Pre-production like whoa for a Vanlande & Warrick animation. Conceptualizing a script, started a test walk cycle for Vanlande and started trying to lock down a style for her. Getting closer, still not right. My pencil sketches look worlds better than my Flash ones, so I may end up doing ink and paper for this...

Enjoy some half-assed texture variants on one of the style tests. She'll be animated, printed on aged looking paper (or textured like hell in photoshop, we'll see how that goes) cut out, and reanimated in stop motion sets alongside Warrick in all his puppety glory.



Major inspiration for this short is coming from Stephane Berla's video for "Tais-toi mon coeur" and Anthony Lucas' "The Mysterious Geographic Explorations of Jasper Morello". Both are amazing, go watch them as well.


I think it's Nyquil time.


MY GOD IT'S FULL OF STARS.

Yachts

Another junk post.

Caught an episode of Samurai Jack on TV the other day. Absolutely adore the sound design in that show. And the art style too. It got me thinking about trying a more geometric, angular style. Just for kicks I scribbled something while watching it but I haven't scanned it. Alas!

I've got a D&D character that I'm really digging. Err, more like her design actually. Or whatever pieces I have of it. I'd like to maybe use her for an animation or something, but if that happens I'll be taking the character in a different direction (more thief, much less berserker... Huuuurrrrr) She's an angular, surly, pointy type of lass.

Quickly scribbled while waiting for my hair dye to set. Hurr. She's lookin' a little Monarch in that head-on one...

Color idea.


Maybe I'll have something of substance soon.


YOU ARE MADE OF MEAT. EVERYTHING THAT IS YOU IS MERELY CHEMICAL REACTIONS. YOU ARE NOT A MAGICAL SPACE BABY.

HALOLOLOLOLOLOLOLOL

Fun with pepakura! Grab your .pdo files and go at it!




About 3 days on and off to cut and assemble. 12 pages of cardstock and a buttload of tape, only because this was just a test. You really can't get it too clean using scotch tape. You really need glue.

I may end up making Master Chief's armour eventually. The helmet was a pretty fun project.


Master Chief? More like AWESOME CHIEF, AMIRITE?

OUR WEAPONS ARE USELESS

Another junky post. Nerdism to the extreme.

So I found some photos from a quick shoot I had while I was in Baltimore. They came out beautifully, I'm totally ecstatic. Major props to LJinto for being so awesome.


Got a few projects clogging up the pipelines. Half is prop related the other half is animation related. More on that later...

I'm currently waiting for a package of epoxy resin and silicone RTV mold making supplies. That should get here Thursday and I can't contain my excitement! NICE MOLD MAKING SUPPLIES. <3 Expect a post on how much I love (or hate) the RTV stuff. I've never had the pleasure of using nice mold-making compounds. It's always cheap plaster, blargh.

In the meantime, enjoy some scrapped spaulders of Wonderflex and Plasti-Paste. Solid as all get-out but totally the wrong shape.


"Illusion," Michael. A trick is something a whore does for money.

I AM ALL THAT IS MAN.

I can now say that I make award-winning props and costumes. Pretty rad, right?



so i herd u herd taht i liek dressing up. Well, I do. Remember the sword I said I was working on and all? I lugged that around in costume this past weekend at Otakon in Baltimore.



If you've ever read/watched Claymore then this'd look familiar, but if not just remember that I'm dressed up as the most badass character from the series, okay? Hurr hurr.

It was a mildly epic weekend. I placed second in the Journeyman in Friday's costume competition. I also played temporary booth babe/promoter for Funimation, the company that acquired the distribution rights to Claymore.



LOOKIT THEM BOOTH BABES. Carloyn (left) and I were asked by the brand manager of Funimation to hang around the booth and do some promo work for the show. We did a 5 minute interview for their site, got lots of pictures, and exchanged cards with them. I didn't get anything out of it except a free DVD of the show but damnit, they have my card.


Also, these are some of the people I roomed with. They are phenomenal and my head almost exploded with all the Mighty Boosh quotes flying around the room.


It was a good weekend in all... Minus the flight back. Remind me never to fly AirTran again. The past couple times have been shite service and organization.

I'm open for prop commissions, preferably weaponry and such as I'd rather not start out trying to fit armour for people I can't readily measure. I don't want you guys to look stupid in my gear, duh. Although I could make some exceptions...

I'm itching to make something new now that this project is done.



So he says to me, 'You wanna be a baaaaad guy?' And I say yeah, baby! I wanna be bad! I SAYS, SURF'S UP SPACE PONIES! I'M MAKING GRAVY WITHOUT THE LUMPS! Aaaaaa-hahahahaha!

Lundy, Fastnet, Irish Sea

This is going to turn into a prop & costume blog if I'm not careful. So here's art-related stuff.

Found a pretty sweet site for quick figure drawing refs. Pose Maniacs! They have a tool where it'll do a set of timed poses. No substitute for a living model of course, but it works fine. Gonna practice later.

Pirate party was awesome. We ate, plundered, drank, and plundered some more. Drew a picture of the costume I had put together since I didn't get pictures. I totally plundered some booty, hurr hurr. .......No, really. There was a treasure chest filled with candy there and I stole some.


I modded a Nerf gun for the costume. It kind of fell apart (yeah hot glue) but I'll post pictures of that when I fix it up. YAAAAAAR.


Dammit! I haven't been to the Olive Garden in, like, forever!

A WEE CASE OF THE INSOMNIAS

FILLER POST FILLER POST FILLER POST FILLER POST

A little too wired for bed at the moment. No drawings this time as I've been knee-deep in fiberglass and adoring it........Uh, kind of. So here's a bit of in progress of ZOMGPROPS and ROFLFIBERGLASS.

This is the honkin' 54" sword that I made in March. Most of it was churned out the week that I needed it... Which was like, two weeks after my tumor surgery. Totally awesome timing. Totally awesome procrastinating.


I (stupidly) cranked that sucker out while I recovering so it's... Not the of best work. It's falling apart; missing an enamel inlay in the top, it's lumpy, and the weathering was all done with my fingers and some ink the night before I needed it. SUPERSMART! Also? I love insulation foam with all my big-as-the-moon heart.

I'm remaking that sucker for an event in August. Just 'glassed and rough sanded the first half of it yesterday.



Oh, those glorious football shoulderpads from hell are just getting spot-filled for divots and other little marks I missed since March. Then a fresh, better coat of paint. That brick of plaster there is my second successful two-part mold. Woo hoo!



The fiberglass cloth goes all transparent when you pour the resin on it. It's a beautiful thing, really.


SUPERB.

HELLO, BONGOPHONE?

"OH HAY GUIZE IM REDY 4 D N D LOLOL wait why ddi u clos teh d00r on me??/ ....guize? ......GUIZEE???!!!!? ...........halp itz cold oot heer rofls D:"




HOLY DICK I CAN HEAR HOW UGLY YOU ARE.

HOLA FRUTA.

I'm going to a party in a few weeks. It's on a boat and it's PIRATE THEMED!

Awesome, right? So what did I decide to do? SKY PIRATE. ... On a boat in the water.... Yes. Of course. With a touch o' the steampunk flair thrust upon it somehow. Here's a thing. Of my costume. Pose was referenced. In a perfect world I'd make this stuff and have that sweet leather bolero jacket but I have like, 2 weeks to pull this off. Maaaaaybe not.


I'm playing around with textures. Uh, clearly. Ignore the throw-away background and wood stuff. Just wanted to test it out style-wise.

Sewing leather without an awl is a terrible, horrible experience. This is why i can't have nice things.


What do rich Pokemon wear?
PokeMONOCLES.

WHAT IS A MA--...Wait, we've all ready been through this...

Kind of a trash post...

After I finished the portrait earlier I went to do another painting. She's my Shepard in Mass Effect. It's a great game, I love it. Couldn't remember what armour she had, couldn't remember what gun, etc. So here's what I started anyway.


And then I found this one while digging through some files earlier. Drew it a couple months ago. So I slapped a texture on it and called it a day. Alfhild lookin' nice and pissy. And fuzzy.



Next post will probably be prop related. Been fixing up a 4.5' claymore I made back in March. Have some Dragon Force ready to go on your iTunes. You'll need it.


The mullet says "business in the front, party in the back."

WHAT IS A MAN? A MISERABLE PILE OF SECRETS

I got hit with an incredible OH MY SWEET JEEZUZ DIGITAL PAINT attack this morning. Must've been something in my coffee.

I haven't done this in a while so it called for a quick 5 minute warm up. That thing is one of the many (many) stupid looking animals I made in Spore's Creature Creator.



Then the actual painting. Self portrait because I'm an egomaniac. Done with a reference. No, I didn't botch the eyes. I look like that on a good day 'cause I've got a mean case of the Thom Yorke.



Excuse me, I'm off to go release an album online that you may or may not pay for.


But I'm a creep
I'm a weirdo

You like eels, boy?

'kay, cool. Second half of the first wave is cleaned (to a degree) and up here. I'm on a roll! Now to scan the second half my book. Let's see how much that'll produce...







We're super magic men!
We stay up till five a.m.!
Although we're bound by shaman law,
What goes on tour... STAYS ON TOUR!

FOR BRITISH EYES ONLY~

More sketchbook stuff. Most of these were done from August to February. Posting this makes me feel... Kind of uneasy. My anatomy is terrible. Aaaand as fearful as I am of being called out on my crappy anatomy... By all means, please do.

I need to find more naked people to draw, dangit.

First up: VANLANDE AND HER TINY HEAD. I laughed when i scanned this in. Terrible. This was the first fleshed-out drawing of her. Also, she's no longer sporting some crappy generic ray gun. She'll have a pistol and a cane. Doesn't really use the pistol but she'll cane you to death good and proper.

That's the flying/I'm-trying-hard-to-show-off outfit, next is her regular lounge about wardrobe.
Cue random drawings. Mostly of a stock character I've got. And wouldn't you know it, she's a berserker. Lulz.




Still got quite a few more sketches up my sleeves. Hopefully some newer stuff that I won't get all "omfgeeeergh D:" when I post. Hopefully I can get around to that before my new video card comes. Once I boot up Mass Effect, I'll probably be gone for a while, haha.


It's not my trick, Michael. .........It's my ILLUSION!

Coffee at 9 pm.

'kay, cool. Cleaned up a few more sketches. Not saying much, as I've still got a bunch more to scan and clean... Have some character designs. One unfinished for my surly Vampire: the Masquerade character, two for a berserker chick (...I really like berserkers), and one of Warrick--version 2.0, mind you.




It's impossible to be unhappy in a poncho.