Gimmie all those hats!

Most definitely, I have the greatest friends in the world. I know, I know, EVERYONE has the greatest friends in the world, but... well.... So do I, is the point. Here's an example of why:

I was talking to my friend Ren about when we should get together and paint something because our schedules were kind of misaligned. When it turned out that she had Saturday available, I said "Yeah, I can do Saturday. I just have to meet this wedding planner and work some stuff out with her."

This was the point at which Ren lost her shit in the most glorious of ways.

"WEDDING PLANNER?!??! OH MY GOSH, DID BILLY PROPOSE?!?!? YESSSSSSSSSS!!!!! I'VE BEEN PLANNING YOUR BACHELORETTE PARTY FOREVER!!!!! IT'S GOING TO BE AT THE REN FAIRE!!!! COMPLETE WITH STRIPPER KNIGHTS!!!! I WANT TO KNOW IF IT'S EVEN POSSIBLE TO STRIP OUT OF SHINING ARMOR!!!!!! OH EM GEEEEEE" At which point I think she started foaming at the mouth, and I could not stop myself from laughing. I mean, really? Stripper knights? I must admit, once she brought up the physical complications of gettin' your groove on while in full plate armor I, too, became morbidly curious as to its doability.... But gettin' assaulted by somebody else's junk just ain't my style. Still, absolutely HILARIOUS.

Apparently, though, I had forgotten to mention that I'd started working with a wedding planner as her graphic designer/assistant. Whoopsies. Here's a sample of what I've been doing for Terri over at Wedding Fairytales:



Very suddenly, I have become the go-to gal for event invitations... Which I'm totally cool with, actually. ESPECIALLY wedding ones, because I jump at any chance to sneak hearts into my work.



In other news! I've decided to take on a lottttttt of different projects. On top of working on The Many Faces of Mister Bubb, I've started a cooking blog called Biscuits-n-Crazy, and begun work on a card game! (The concept of which I'll share once I've sorted out enough images. I've already got almost a hundred ready! Whoo!)

As always, dear reader, I hope you're having an amazing day. However! If you find yourself feeling a bit down, here's a clip of the Jim Henson puppet stage show (Called Stuffed and Unstrung) that... if it comes to your town, you should IMMEDIATELY buy tickets for. I promise you, you'll love it.

It's rainin' cats, hallelujah!

This month has seen some interesting changes, not least of which is my sudden overflow of cat-related artwork! Most people who know me, know that I have two true, sickening obsessions... My boyfriend Billy, and my cat Bubba (whose proper name is Prince but which has been obliterated due to overuse of nicknames). I've been itching to make a children's book for a while, now, but couldn't seem to get any of my ideas to work once I started tinkering with them. It almost felt like my brain and my hand were more occupied with getting into some sort of epic slap-fight with one another than doing my bidding, which really didn't sit well with me. Frustrated by my sudden art block, I complained to my flu-ridden boyfriend that I couldn't seem to do anything I really wanted to. Now I'm not sure if this was a stroke of brilliance or a stroke of fever talking, but he said "Why don't you write a book about Bubba?"

From there on out it was like DUH, WHY DID I NEVER THINK OF THIS BEFORE?!?!? The tentative title is set to be "The many faces of Mr. Bubba," which is a book about all the things my cat does that we decide are him pretending to be something else... like a doctor when we're sick, or a mountaineer when he climbs on top of us while we're sleeping. I was super excited by this concept and immediately got to work planning the character designs and laying out a couple of pages... including the cover, for which I've decided to use a different style than my norm. Here's a preview of the in-progress work for it!



I tried about a billion zillion different cat designs before I settled on making him absurdly cute, with eyes almost as big as his whole head! Interestingly, the process I've been using is super different from what I've been doing all year, which I think is actually one thing I was craving. I was getting bored with being comfortable and wanted to branch out and experiment again, so.... Voila! Not a single drop of ink was used in this piece, and in fact... the bits of red you see are the remnants of the roughly 1"x1" pencil sketch I used as my guide for this. I haven't done enough purely digital stuff, and so far... this has been a lot of fun!

Now of course, like some sort of act of fate... The woot.com derby was announced yesterday as being kitties! How crazy is that?!?!? In the middle of me drawing cats, I'm actually encouraged to draw MORE cats?! Well obviously, I decided this was an awesome idea and produced the following t-shirt design, which I'm hoping does well this week! You can vote for my design at the woot.com derby, which I would very, very much appreciate. But, if you'd just like to see the design, here it is!



I did not appreciate just how 80's Lion-o's hair is until I got to draw it... Man... That mane is glorious.

Well, that's all for now, folks! And rememmber....

A sacrifice to the porcelain throne.

As I mentioned in my previous post, a number of the gifts I gave away this Giftmas were given new homes without being documented (I originally had a really weird section here where I went crazy comparing the prezzies to illegal aliens and it got suuuuuper out of hand. It was kind of funny, but kind of weird. Kind of... really weird. So it's gone, now. Poof!). Luckily! Brandi so graciously has provided us all with photographs of the portraits she and her husband received from me this year! Yay!!!!

About a year ago, when they moved into their house, Jimmy and Brandi started getting fun with decorating all their rooms with paint and pictures and curtains and all sorts of stuff that has made their place seriously gorgeous... But for the life of her, Brandi was unable to find any wall-art that would match the color scheme in their bathroom.


(This one's Brandi! She thinks I drew her low on the page because I often draw people looking terrifying, but actually it's because she's a munchkin and I originally was going to draw her and Jimmy on the same page together and have it so neither of them was fully captured on the page because I think extreme height differences are hilaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaarious and deserve to be celebrated.)

Their bathroom has a super-rich red that's a couple of shades darker than what most people would look at and involuntarily shout "RED!!!!" as well as a very nice soft, light brown, and white. She'd pitched to me a good long while ago the idea of commissioning some portraits of her, and her husband, and their super fabulous dogs.


(This one's Aulbee, he's such a sweetheart! And a proper gentleman, to boot. Possibly one of the best groomsmen at their wedding, although that's a hard title to claim given the sheer awesomeness of that lot.)

Our plans got a little out of hand, and I decided that I wanted to make the pictures SO SUPER FABULOUSLY SPECIAL and was going to hand-make paper with her out of some of the leftover cotton from their southern belle/Irish as all hell wedding [which we should still do!!!!!!!] and use it for the portraits to make it sort of a secret specialness that was super cool.


(Here's Jimmy!!! He is both super Irish, and super tall. You may think that sash is a little too much, but I promise you... This is based on real-life. He was pretty much dubbed little Mr. Irish king of the universe in a pageant or something, as far as I have decided based on photographs and a wild imagination. I hope that he rules his subjects wisely.)

We kind of got carried away with the idea, but never got an actual chance to do it so the paper has, sadly, continued to go unmade. However, that doesn't mean the portraits should suffer for my laziness and short attention span!!!! Which is why I made them these anyway, despite it being somewhat divergent from the plan.


(Meet Bama! She's kind of a derpsauce pooch, and as sweet as she can be... well... I am cruel and imagine her looking like this in my head. This is, almost certainly, my favorite of the portraits for how ridiculous it is, and how seeing that tongue flopped out never fails to make me giggle.)

Now despite the fact that these are goofy pictures, and just ink on watercolor paper mounted on some random heavy-weight red paper I found and guestimated being a good match for the bathroom that I completely intended them to be displayed in... They immediately went and had them mounted, framed, and displayed in a place of honor in their hallway.




You walk into their house, and these are basically one of the first things you're going to see. I am kind of stunned, and incredibly flattered! ...The downside is, though, that there's still nothing hanging in their bathroom, and I'm not sure what to make to fix that problem for fear that it will be too fancy again and and be put in another place of honor. Oh, woe is me with my terrible, horrible problem of being appreciated. =>.<=

Seriously though, I'm super flattered and super glad they like them!

Welcome to the world of tomorrow!!!

'Allo blokes and blokettes! It's been a refreshing sort of holiday-time for me, given that I took a full and total week off from work and life and ran away to the strange and mystical country of "New Jersey" to learn the secrets of Christmas! Oh, what a glorious time was had by all.... except for the bit towards the end where I got the flu and then had to go back to work and life and reality and long for the days of freedom. Ah, freedom. Anywho! I finished the comic the week before Christmas and sent it off to the publisher, so I'll keep you lot updated on when that'll be available for public consumption. In the meantime, here's something I couldn't share with you before because it was a gift for someone!



Sadly, the other things I made either weren't photographed [the Cut the Rope-based ornament I made for Billy and the series of portraits I made for Brandi and Jimmy], or haven't been given to their owners AND haven't been photographed [the painting I made for my youngest sister, Nanners.] So hopefully, some day, I'll have photos of those and be able to share them with you lot.

In other news, I've been watching a lottttttttttttttt of Doctor Who lately and have officially decided that David Tennant is like, totally, like, the cooooooooolest doctor of them all. The companion he's currently got as far as my viewing goes is Donna, and to date I think that his best pairing was with Rose. Now, Rose was RUBBISH when Christopher Eccleston was The Doctor, but she hit her stride once Tennant came on the scene and their on-screen chemistry was amazing! The companions he's had since Rose [Martha Jones and Donna Knoble] have been great characters with great attributes and quite a lot of spunk, but they haven't really felt as genuine to me as the connection he and Rose ended up having. Then again, I'm only on the Agatha Cristie episode with Donna, and I'm fast beginning to like her... enthusiasm and cleverness. Also her no-nonsense attitude towards some of the things they come up against, and her confidence. I like to see daring and confidence in the companions.

Anywho! I've been playing around with the idea of doing some Doctor Who art, as well as some fairytale-based art and have sketches of the latter already prepared and ready to go... But I may decide to give that all up and go ahead writing about fire trucks. This story's been a long time coming, and I never really thought about telling it but now I've thought of it I can't really help but want to see if I can let it grow. There's a whole lot of future out there and I'm looking forward to seeing it!

Bubba's got it in the bag.

My cat, whom I affectionately refer to as Bubba quite often, is... well, he's a dumb butt. He is the sweetest, most lovable cat I think I've ever owned and I love him more than I know how to express but gosh can he be pretty derpy sometimes. As such, The Bubbs will often... Well... Play with his poop. He'll just scoop it right on up out of his litter box and swat it around the house like he's some sort of 3rd world kitty who doesn't have plenty of toys to play with and so has to improvise. This being one of his favorite activities, I've gotten accustomed to watching my step in the mornings in order to prevent the possibility of a very unpleasant squish... Which is why this morning, when I walked out of my room, I was a little bit irritated at the round lump near the bathroom door... Until I looked closer and saw this:



Now, I have been a vegetarian for forever. I feel completely awful whenever I see a dog getting abused or a crab getting boiled or any other number of things that involve pain and suffering being bestowed upon all animals but... seeing this poor mouse horrifyingly mutilated to the point that it was darn near unrecognizable aside from the single remaining leg, bizarrely pin-straight tail, and tiny red spot where I'm assuming the head and neck were... Well... I couldn't help but be proud. Mama's little dumb-head is all growed up and huntin' mice? D'awwww. It's good to see that even in this tough economy, my cat has managed to find work. :D

Annnnnyway! It's the holidays, guys! Are you pumped?! Because I am! I'd say the only downside of the holidays is that I have to wait for FOREVER before I can share with you some of the things I'm giving out this year since that would ruin the surprise. I love giving out presents, and I'm super psyched for Christmas! I never knew what the fuss was all about until I got to celebrate my first real one last year but man... Christmas is magical. The love that permeates the atmosphere is completely palpable, and so very, very wonderful. I hope you all have an amazing holiday and get to spend plenty of time with your loved ones. I know I sure will. :)

The quest for the perfect brush.

Normally when I ink, I use a nib pen for the whole thing, and only consider touching a brush if there's a particularly large area that needs some ink slapped on it. I've been going on like this for years, not really considering the brush to be a primary tool so much as a convenient afterthought! However, when I inked one page in particular of Little Red Men, I realized that I'd need HUGE lines from the getgo, and decided to ink the whole thing with a brush on a whim.



This just so happens to be that very page! I'm permitted to share up to 25% of the comic before it's published, and given how sparingly I've teased you, I feel like this is permissible. ANYWAY, the only brushes I had available to me at the time were some pretty worn down, beat up, and desperately depressing white nylon brushes that did the trick, but were less than desirable. Even still, I noticed that my inking time had been virtually cut in half with each stroke! And while I did sacrifice quite a bit of stability and control by giving up my pen, I suddenly had an extremely varied number of line weights that I could make in a single stroke. So, I decided it was time to experiment with brush work.

Once I got it in my head that this was a viable method, it became pretty much obvious that I'd need to upgrade my materials... So I fired up the ol' Googletron 9000 and asked it what brushes were best for inking. The internet seems to unanimously praise the Windsor and Newton series 7 [in particular, sizes 2 or 3] brush and claim it to be the one brush to rule them all. Then then in their next sentence speak of how there truly is only ONE brush to rule them all as the company has gone downhill and serviceable-much less actually perfect-brushes from W&N can no longer be found. Besides, it's roughly $20 or $30 per brush, apparently, and I don't really have that kind of scratch lying around for one single brush that may or may not work.

Enter Rosemary and Co. The internet has mixed feelings about the company, and just a few years ago they were praised as being phenomenal brushes at outrageously affordable prices... But something has clearly happened to the company. Perhaps they have become exceedingly popular and can not keep up with demand? I decided to take my chances and looked into their brushes. Not really knowing what to get, I decided to e-mail Rosemary and ask her for some advice on which brushes to purchase based on how I like my brushes to feel, and that I was planning on working with ink. She got back to me nearly immediately and was extremely helpful!!! So I ordered my brushes that night and despite them being shipped from Europe, received them within three days! Holy crap!!! Not only that, but a free catalog that has EVERY SINGLE BRUSH THEY MAKE photographed at real-size?!?!? Wow. The customer service at Rosemary & Co. is certainly not lacking, that's for sure. However...



See that blurry phone photo? [Sorry, but my digital camera is broken and this is the only thing I've got that takes pictures right now.] See how the left side looks kind of... lumpy? Perhaps even... separate? This is one of the four Rosemary brushes that I ordered, which after shipping, only cost $30. Two are Kolinski sable, and two are Red sable which means that at basically $20 before shipping, this is a pretty pimp deal. Well, in theory it is.

You see, pretty much all four of my Rosemary brushes have problems, this one in particular had the most drastic problems because the bristles were caught in that stupid protective plastic sleeve thing and bent backwards over the handle. I trimmed the super-deformed bristles as close to the ferrule as I possibly could so I would be able to jump right in and try them without having to wait a couple more days for a replacement... Which would have been free, but which actually... I don't even want any more. This photo was taken AFTER I trimmed the brush, and after I used it for the first time. The darned thing went completely coo coo! Hairs were just splaying out everywhere depending on what they wanted to do at any given stroke! And it wasn't the only one! Essentially every single brush I ordered from Rosemary is absurdly frustrating and discouraging to use because of how poorly it functions! Not only is the belly pretty thin, making the ink-reservoir in the brush pretty minimal, but every single one of them has this curiously specific point. I gather that it is good when a brush comes to a point that is essentially one hair, but the lengths to which Rosemary & co. went to ensure that was the case is just ridiculous! There was one single hair at the tip that seemed to be ever so slightly longer than all the rest, causing it to actually be more of a pain in the butt than an advantage! That particular hair would always go off on its own adventures and come back later to tell everyone else they were doing it wrong and attempt to garner more support for the rebel army! I inked a verrrrrrrrrry simple piece with those brushes that I'll share with you all in the near future and I could not WAIT for it to be over just so I could put them away and NEVER USE THEM AGAIN.




The brushes on the right are the ones that are from Rosemary, and the one that is to the far left is basically the only one that's even remotely usable... And I do mean remotely.

Because of how awful my experience with these brushes was, I decided that it would be wrong to tell you all about them and not offer an alternative, so last night I went to Blick with my friend Mike and rummaged through their brushes. I found this GREAT brush that I think was made by a company named Isabey or something along those lines, but nearly had a heart attack when I saw that it was $75 for just the one brush. I shit you not. It seemed like an actually really good brush due to the springyness of the bristles [which were, of course, sable], the verrrrry full belly, the tight crimping of the ferrule, and the fact that it came to a splendid point and had no flyaways or clipped bristles anywhere. When I sulked back to the spot where the expensive dream brush was supposed to live until some more fortunate artist that I hope knows how to show a brush a good time comes along to claim it... I noticed that Blick has their own line of brushes. The three brushes on the top of that photograph are the ones from Blick's line and I've got to say... They're pretty darn good.

That is NOT to say that they are AMAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAZING, but they are good enough that I'm actually really excited to keep playing with them, and I am super grateful that I didn't want to gouge my own eyes out with them. If you can see well enough from the picture, the bellies are quite a bit fuller in the Blick brushes than the Rosemary ones, which was super duper nice of them. Not only that, but I have not yet had to deal with a flyaway!



The springness of these brushes is great, and even though I had that tiny little size four brush, I actually ended up using the ten for the bulk of the piece, only really going to the four for the eyes and suuuuper tiny fiddly bits. The 16 that I got was superb for filling in huge spaces and actually also came to an impressively fine point! They were also great for little bits of dry-brushing, and did not even for a moment complain about being abused so early in their life-springing back to a perfect point the instant I dipped them in some good ol' water. Did I also mention that together, these three brushes only cost me $25? Yeah. I'd say I got more than what I paid for in this case. These brushes were a joy to work with and for that price, there's really no reason NOT to stock up on a couple and at least try them out!




I know that I've still got a long way to go before I've mastered the brush, and I really think that my only obstacle is learning to let go of my incessant need to tightly control each line, but I definitely believe that having actually found some decent brushes is the best favor I could have done for myself.

So, to recap, Rosemary & co. = no go. Generic Blick-brand brushes? Get 'em. Also, my Totoro inkwell continues to be the coolest darned thing ever. I've been abusing that thing and shaking it around like crazy and spinning it and all sorts of crap and it not only takes the beating, but doesn't spill a single drop of ink. I friggin' love this thing.



Here's the finished image that I used to test the brushes. Thank goodness these ones weren't duds, because this piece is for Billy! Our anniversary is next week, and it's about time I gave him another art. Two years in, and loving him is still the most magical adventure I've ever been taken on.

... I might change the coloring, though.

A helpful tutorial, I hope!

Well, I was checking the now completely addictive Comic Tools blog and saw that included this week was a method for colorizing lineart. Sort of. I thought it was super interesting the way that Elanor Davis chose to layer two copies of the same image, changed to different colors, in order to achieve a sort of duochrome look. Well, I decided that it may very well end up being helpful if I also shared a method for colorizing lineart in Photoshop that varies wildly from her approach. Hope it helps someone because it pretty much blew my mind when I learned it!

Click here for the video! I definitely recommend doing fullscreen, since the program I used to record the video recorded it in its native size. Whoopsies!

Is it the snowtimes?

Yes! I've now officially broken in the Totoro inkwell and it worked brilliantly! The mouth now has an expected ring of black ink on the inside and I stupidly decided to pour just a wee bit of glaze in the mouth and not properly allow it to dry before inking so there's now a small paintless patch on the inside, but it's otherwise perfect! Held the ink just splendidly, the mouth was exactly the right width for me to swirl the brush around in, and despite moving Totoro around like crazy, he never once spilled! As an added bonus, the teeth proved to be an excellent place to quickly wipe off any excess ink from the brush since they're a ledge hanging inwards!

Here's what I decided to make tonight during the testing-just a very quick doodle that all said and done, probably took about an hour total, which is absurdly quick for me. Plus, I stopped halfway through the sketch and played "who's a big dumb head that just got their nose bopped?!?!!!!" with my cat for a bit.



This was so much fun to just knock out! I'm definitely going to experiment more with my inking, and the first step I've definitely got to take is getting some real brushes! I have no idea why, but basically every single brush I was able to find tonight was either a falling apart white nylon brush, or a falling apart 'comes in a pack of five but are totally the worst brushes you'll ever use' discount brushes. I KNOW I used to have some decent ones, but they're either buried in the chaos of my hallway closet, or they were lost in a move. Either way, it's probably about time I upgraded to well-informed growed-up art brushes and that's exactly what I intend to do! Well... Sort of.

I spent a large chunk of the night looking for advice on what brushes to use, and the internet seems to have come to the conclusion that all hope is lost as all brush manufacturers are either crap, expensive, expensive crap, or expensive crap that just isn't like how it used to be. So I've settled on ordering some brushes from Rosemary and Co. because heck, they're cheap and so am I! Besides, if I'm going to take a chance on good-quality brushes being horrible I may as well go for a brand that not only gives a money back guarantee, but will instantly replace any product that you report to them is unsatisfactory, no questions asked. Now try getting THAT kind of deal from Windsor & Newton.

Once I get around to figuring out just which Rosemary brushes I want, I think I'll do a review of them, since I really appreciated the recommendations I found online for different brushes and like to think that someone else will be as grateful for the advice of someone who actually experienced the product as I was.

My Inkwell Totoro

So I was reading this post on comic tools and pretty much flipped my lid. First of all, I've been looking for something decent to put my ink in while working that I wasn't afraid would tip over when I nudged it or my cat decided to be naughty and hop up next to it and dip his paw into [he's actually really good when I'm working and almost always patiently waits, curled up next to me, for break time. But I'm always afraid that he'll get brave and jump up here and murder whatever I'm working on, just like he used to when he was a kitten.] and get ink EVERYWHERE. I don't know why it never occurred to me to just make something but MAN the instant I saw Amalgamated Biscut's little ceramic inkwell that reminds me surprisingly of Astroboy, I knew what I had to do. So last night, I got to working on making my own out of Super Sculpy!





I mean, just look at this guy!!!!



I'm pretty much certain that this is basically the coolest thing I'll ever make.



Now obviously, my concerns were much different when making this than Biscuit's were, but it is EXACTLY what I wanted, and needed. My BIGGEST concern was stability, because as of this morning alone I've knocked at least three brushes, a round container, a roll of tape, and the lid to something off my desk... Knowing this about myself, I knew it would be best to make sure there was something that laid flat and reduced the chances of spillage dramatically. I was also looking for something that I'd be able to put ink into easily but also be able to take ink out of without too much hassle, either by brush or by the little drip squeezer that comes in my ink. A lot of times when I'm inking, because I'm worried about being messy and I don't have anything decent to put my ink in, I'll squeeze out a couple of drops of ink from the eyedropper onto my pen or brush EVERY SINGLE TIME I need to refill it. It's tedious, it's a pain, but it's not messy or wasteful and it gets the job done. Gosh darn though, I'm so excited about this Totoro inkwell and I can't WAIT to take it out for a spin! Now, I'll be spending today coloring more of the comic, but I've got exactly the PERFECT piece in mind to break in My Inkwell Totoro and I simply can not wait!!!

And, for those of you who either don't know who Totoro is or who DO know who Totoro is and love him just as much as I do, here's a spot that Cartoon Network ran when they premiered it on their channel. It's even got the part of the film that I based my inkwell off of in it! Yay!



Double bonus!!! Orchestral version of one of the Totoro themes!!!

And what's the deal with those October snowstorms?

Finally! Halloween came and knocked our socks off with a kind of random and uncalled-for snow storm. Luckily, in my area there was only a light... smattering... of snow, but a couple of my friends reported having gotten up to 2 feet of snow! Holy moley! Sadly, the snow canceled my plans to revisit the Renaissance Faire on its final weekend, but I had a darned good time anyway. Linvilla Orchards had some AWESOME pumpkins up for grabs, so I took the opportunity to carve a rather swell Totoro [from My Neighbor Totoro] pumpkin... Which is not pictured below. Instead, I'm spreading the love by 'accidentally' hitting 'put that preview of Little Red Men' up on this blog. Whoopsies, clumsy me! Kind of the same concept as when you're making yourself a nice pot of grits and you just happen to trip and drop a block of cream cheese in while crossing the kitchen. [Wise advice from Paula Deen, let me tell you...]



This page was a lot of fun for me to color, because I really liked playing with the skyline in the first [heck, ONLY] panel. Really brings me back to when I was a kid and we'd sit on the roof of the house and just watch the stars show up.

And, since it's been a while since I've shared anything from Misa, here's something else to add to the 'not getting used this time!' collection!



We've got a new line of treatments coming out soon, and the owners wanted a quick header card so they could send out an advance package of them to Trade Secrets. When I asked if they had any imagery or themes or colors that they wanted incorporated into the design, I was only given "Fresh and clean." Which caused me to hum "So fresh and so clean, clean" while doodling that. We've decided to go in a more photographic direction, so that means I'm free to share that little gem! And as an odd sort of treat, I'll leave you with this video.



What a random song to suddenly have stuck in my head.

I went to the Ren Faire yesterday!

Heya chumps and chumpettes! It's been a long, winding month here in crazytown and I've finally had a chance to check in!

This half of the year is always kind of hectic for me, because in addition to all them fancy 'give everybody ALL THE GIFTS' holidays that are now, about 3/4 of my friends have their birthdays between September and December. Oh no!!! My lovely, wonderful, gorgeous, amazing, and absurdly loving friend Ren's birthday was last month, and I sadly did not have any money to buy her anything. That's not to say that I normally buy people things in the first place [What artist DOESN'T make at least 2/3 of the gifts they give?], but I had an idea of something to purchase this time around and was kind of disappointed that I had to default to handmade. So anyway! This year, I made her an inked [and later mounted] drawing of her Pathfinder character, Ehalania, and her... Pet? Fuzzy-Wuzzums. I shit you not, that's what she named her character's tiger. We have some AMAZING adventures together every Sunday and I felt like this was an entirely appropriate gift, especially given that I was going to give it to her right after one of our Pathfinder sessions anyway.



That week, I was reeeeeeally craving some deep-inking, but I haven't done anything with extreme shadows in quite a while. I figured if I pulled it off, she'd win a fun and unexpected piece! And if not, well.... Then I at least got to experiment. I feel like I could have done a bunch more detailing and played around with texture and dry-brushing, but Ren loved it so... Who cares! This was fun for me to make, and it gave me some great ideas for whenever I get around to making a picture of my own character.

As a little bonus, I'm feeling generous [and a bit guilty for not having posted for quite some time] and have elected to share a very rough beginning stage of the coloring of the first page of Little Red Men, a forthcoming comic written by the talented Sam Verrall and illustrated by the dead-sexy... Me.



This page has a lonnnnnnnnng way to go until it's finished, but I'm having fun messin' around with it and trying to decide on the best way to create the warm, reflective lighting from the fireplace. Gosh though, this comic looks like it's about creepy aliens that wear wigs according to that last panel. ... I kinda like it.

This weekend, I'll be taking a break from the comic [probably] to help the infamous Brandi make some paintings for her brand new office!... And celebrate Billy's Mom's Birthday! .... And his god-sister's birthday!!! [See, told you there were a lot of birthdays right now. My roomate's birthday is in like... two weeks and I'm still not done her gift yet, either!]. I've actually really missed painting and I'm suuuuuper excited to bust out the ol' staple gun when I stretch the canvas. Hopefully we finish the paintings quickly and I get to photograph them and share!

Don't tell your mom!

There isn't a preview here, certainly! I would NEVER dream of giving off a few crude sketches from random panels of the comic I'm working on to give you guys a taste of how it's coming along. Why, I object to your accusations! I am a standup citizen of the artistic community and I would certainly not abuse my powers of illustration to share some here-and-there bits that won't make sense all jumbled and out of context anyway! Gawrsh. Just what kind of dame do you think I am?

But speaking of previews, this certainly isn't one.



Now that we've got that out of the way though, I feel like I can get on with my business. Which is certainly not taking a nap during my lunch break, if that was what you were thinking. Because it's not. It's something else.

It's okay to let yourself believe you're beautiful.

Our first Valentine's day together, I made a doll for Billy that looked a lot like me, and had a small, handmade book tucked away inside a plush heart it was holding. It's basically the most personal thing I think I've ever made, and despite constant nagging from everyone who's seen it, I kind of refuse to make any more. I feel like it's special because it's the only one that exists and because I put so much heart and hard work into it. Lately, though, I've been trying to come up with some extra cash for a badly needed new laptop... As well as a vacation to Disneyworld and more than just a few goodies from http://www.damseldress.com . Of course, it kept getting suggested over and over again that I make dolls for people and sell them on etsy, and while I'm mostly unwilling to do it, I've sort of started to consider it a possibility. As well as making custom mailboxes, for whatever reason. Anyway, just as I was starting to think about sewing dolls, I came across these awesome ones that the previously mentioned Damsel in this Dress magic-maker, Michelle, created. They're fantastic pirate dolls! I was waiting for one to pop up that looked like Billy, but... It never did. So I made one myself! It's kind of crude, and quite a bit creepy, but I effin' love it!



On a completely different note... Lately, at work, my boss has been talking to me about beauty. Now, I am a VERY large woman, but I am completely comfortable in my body. However, she is an itty-bitty, super-skinny woman and is terribly ashamed of hers. She thinks she's fat, and she thinks she's ugly, and she thinks that if she loses that last five pounds that she seriously does not have left to lose, then she'll finally stop being known as 'the chunky' one in her family and stop feeling so ugly. I think that's kind of horrible, because she's got the kind of body that people practically kill themselves to achieve and she still feels like she isn't pretty. Meanwhile, I'm sitting to her left at least five times her weight, hair completely frizzy, and clothes completely riddled with holes and I KNOW that I'm effin' gorgeous. So what's wrong with this picture? Pretty much everything.
It is completely horrible that someone who is so obviously beautiful will never, ever feel that way because her family, her industry, and every single thing she's ever seen has told her that she's not. Why? It doesn't make any sense. And I know it's not just her who feels this way. It breaks my heart that there are so many beautiful people out there who are afraid to let themselves believe that they are beautiful. Are they waiting for someone to tell them otherwise? Prove them wrong? Who has that kind of power?!?! Are they waiting for some divine sign or a billboard with their face and a thumbs up on it or Tyra friggin' Banks to knock on their door and say she's jealous of them? It's ridiculous! I wish, I WISH that more people had the strength to look at themselves, I mean REALLY look at themselves, and see the truth. We are ALL beautiful. I mean it. If you're just willing to admit it to yourself for one second then you'll feel so much better. It's an awful thing to walk around all day, hating yourself; an awful, and exhausting thing. I think it's high time that a whole bunch more people free themselves.

Anyway, here's another picture of me and my Billy doll. I love this man with more than my whole heart, and he tells me every single day that I'm beautiful. So is he.



Love yourself. You ARE beautiful.

Is it hot in here, or is it just me?

Life has been CRAZY busy lately! Last weekend was The Fourth of July, of course, and Billy and I went up to Jersey to get some Wild Bill's Soda at Kaboomfest [Sadly, we got rained out and managed only to get the world's second most expensive kettle corn before turning around going home for dinner with his folks.] and actually had a pretty awesome weekend overall, especially because Billy's parents made some AWESOME veggie fajitas before we left. I ended up requesting the fourth off from work [holidays don't really exist here] and even though it ended up being a long weekend, I came home EXHAUSTED and have only just recovered! Speaking of work, here's something that won't ever get used!!!!

There's a new collection of polishes coming out that are based on a 1950s sort of theme, and they're AWESOME. Unfortunately, not only is this design not going to be used at all, but they ended up outsourcing and decided on something that has nothing to do with the 50s in even the slightest. How that makes sense I'll never understand, but it's what they're going with so... Yippie? I think the problem is that the folks here originally envisioned the collection as being a french cafe sort of thing, but when I brought the 1950s thing to the table, they fell head over heels for the funky names and the way it actually made the colors [which could only be described as 'old lady' ish] exciting... But forgot that it doesn't really make sense not to continue that theme into the marketing campaigns. Ah well. I really like the way this mockup came out and will tooooooooootally use it for something of my own if I figure out what I want to do with it.

Because of the three day weekend, this week has been going by ridiculously fast, and I'm kind of blown away that in just a couple more days, I'll be going to my third ever wedding! I ordered a dress online since I didn't have anything that would be appropriate for the event and it's supposed to arrive riiiiiiiight before I leave, so I'm cutting it pretty close. I suppose it won't be so bad if it doesn't show up, though, since I made sure I had enough extra money to buy a cheap dress on the fly if I need to and Billy's mom really wants to go out shopping. Personally, I hate shopping... But I LOVE Billy's mom, so I think it'll work out just okey dokey.

Unfortunately, because this is the second weekend in a row that has been claimed by family events and whatnot, the only time I've been able to work on the comic is right after work on the weekdays. Happily, I've gotten the pencils for two final pages about half a squiggle away from being finished!!! Unhappily... We're getting into that murky area of how much I'm allowed to show you, which is why the next few posts will probably have a lot more images of work-related stuff and a lot fewer images of comic-related jiggers.

Goin' a bit batty. Har har har.

Howdy, y'all! So, I'm taking the weekend off from working on the comic to hang out in Jersey and celebrate father's day with Billy's family! I'm super excited to get a move on the cooking that Brandi and I are going to do for the Sunday BBQ [The Gluten-Free kid and Vegetarian kid are going to do some cooking for Glutenized meat-eaters?!!? Oh noooooooooo!!!!!] because we always have awesome food adventures and, this time, we're going to be playing board games and watching Dr.Who simultaneously! How jealous are you?

So obviously, there are going to be some awesome treats getting pumped out for Billy's family this weekend, but what do I have for you? Well, I'm glad you asked! First, and most excitingly, I have one COUNT IT, one actual finalized and finished.... panel... for the comic!



The way this panel came about was that one day, during my character-sketching bonanza, I got fed up with fiddling about poses and turning heads and designing chairs and just wanted to draw! ...But it doesn't really make sense to draw just whatever the heck while I've got this awesome project to pull from and decided to take one of the more striking images that Sam, the writer, specified in the script. It was originally just something I was doing because I wanted to keep sane and because I wanted to procrastinate while still being able to claim productivity but... I ended up going all out. Luckily, this particular panel was written to be a sort of inset panel on the page, so it doesn't matter that I made it completely separately from a fully-realized page. I'm pretty pumped about the way this came out, and Sam went super crazy over it, too!

Also, here's some stuff that I did for work that didn't make the cut!



This piece WAS going to be the cover of a brochure for this Summer's newest polish collection but, unfortunately, they decided to just not do a brochure at all! This project was a lotttt of fun to do and I was glad they let me try it out riiiight up until they decided not to go with it. Le sad. This is a common theme though becaaaaaaause....



this one is ALSO not being used. The rejection of these two designs was particularly heartbreaking to me because, obviously, they are fully-realized... I had a lot of fun working on the projects so I guess I shouldn't be sad about them. Plus, I got to take home the props from the second one and am tooooootally going to add them to my studio at home. I forgot how much I loved painting with actual paint until I did that UFO! Even though it was done with acrylic [my LEAST favorite paint] and with an eh quality brand of paints, it was just... fun!

You know what else is fun, though? Making your own guacamole! ... Which I'm going to do right.... NOW.

Progress!

Howdy! And welcome to the post in which I give you some very vague previews and slightly-related character sketches! Above you will find Dr. Can't-be-bothered-to-look-up-his-first-name-right-now Freeborn... Mostly. The colored one, while more entertaining, is not the final version that I'll be going with. However, the floating heads on the second image ARE! Huzzah! Freeborn is the hero of our... unique... tale. Well, I wouldn't really call him a 'hero' so much as 'a guy the story follows.' Nonetheless, he's a rather interesting chap! How is he interesting? Well, he is in no way related to an octopus, for one. And he has not been reported as wearing an ice cream cone as a hat for another. Also, he seems to be particularly poor at winning bets but excellent at drinking to the point that bets start flowing freely. Only some of that is relevant to the tale, really.




This chap is, for all intensive purposes, about as important in the story as Freeborn is. Interestingly, he doesn't actually have a name! He's listed in the script simply as "Guide" which is certainly his duty in the comic. Personally, I think he's a bit of a dumb-head, as you may well notice from the little side notes surrounding him. I'm not going to reveal what all that's about quite yet, but I gotta tell ya... As stories go, this one is bizzarrrrre. It involves an old myth that is all kinds of super-kooky and makes for one incredibly interesting story. It involves Australia, fig trees, and the color red quite heavily. OH NO, WHAT EVER DOES THAT ALL ADD UP TO?!?!?! No, seriously, you probably don't know. It's a very obscure myth but I honestly love the heck out of the tale that Sam, the writer, has made of it. Stay tuned for more, later!!! I think I'm going to spend my evening inking.

Exciting things!!!!

One day, long, long ago, I went crazy. Because I know if I say "one day, very recently, I went crazy" a lot of the people who know me will chuckle and say "Don't you mean a long time ago, super-kooky crazy-pants?" and I'm typically inclined to agree with them. SO on a separate, more recent, not-related occasion to the origination of my super-duper batshit crazybutts off-rockerness, I went off my rocker even further and decided it would be an excellent idea to just send off my portfolio to some comic publishers. Those people earlier who were chucklin' and tellin' me I've been crazy since forever all know very well that I do have a deep love of visual storytelling, whether it be in comics or childrens' books or those insert pictures you never seem to be fortunate enough to get in books past the young-adult age-typed novels... I just dig it. I love the idea that you're reading something and there's a visual aid right there in front of you that helps make the entire immersion of the experience that much more spectacular... Anyway, I am excited to say that my "Eff it, why not?" attitude has led to success!
One of the things I'll be working on for perhaps the next two months is a comic for Viper Comics, written by a rather interesting chap named Sam. Now, rather than give you any details about the project AT ALL, I'm going to, instead, say that we are both SUPREMELY excited and give you a piece that I did for work that will not be used. :D





More details to follow at some undetermined point and time!!!!! ... There will be character sketches up soon I suspect.

An example of inking.

Dear universe,

I love inking. Here's some proof!


















That is all!

Smooches,
Kat.