Fun_MoreOrLes_L

I'll be real, I think of dance as an inferior art, if it can even be considered art.

But Les Twins are one of the few entities who actually make me see and understand dance as art.

4/10/16

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Fun_Calt.Flarmy_L

Lines from an old Goblin token I was working on.

It's based on Florrie, of all people. I figure as a drummer, she'd make a great Goblin, since the gag is she's banging on stuff with a little mallet thing. Hilarious, right? Right.

Not sure what to do with this...straight to Copics? Inks? I'm guessing it'll be an experimental one, so I'm mainly posting this in case it goes horribly wrong.

No real reason to get on this though, since Goblin tokens aren't really in demand these days.

4/9/16

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Fun_Looming

I've heard such great things about Andrew Loomis, so I'm starting to study him.

Hope that gets the magic going.

4/9/16

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Fun_WrightIsle

This is a study of one of my favorite islands.

I actually prefer/love black, but I feel like we just never get cool or beautiful Swamps, for the most part. Islands are more like a given that they're gonna look gorgeous.

4/9/16

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Hare_DoofNoShinpai

The final colors of this fully digital piece.

It was for some flyer about a dangerous street corner or whatever, and he's wearing one of their sweaters.

Notably, I was using my pre-KNKL coloring style, which I learned from studying Chamba and other cel-shaders.

After watching KNKL, I learned there was a bit of a cleaner, tweakable method using clipping masks.

4/9/16

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Fun_DTKcity

Another ballpoint study from the riot.

I was listening to an old MTG Potpourri while drawing this, hence the title.

4/9/16

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Hare_DoofNoShinpai_L

Linework for a dealio.

4/9/16

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Fun_BaseballBaroness

Son, this ain't little league; if you suck, get off the diamond.

4/7/16

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Fun_BaseBallBaroness_L

Just drawing random stuff and seeing where it goes. Wanted to try like a bandana and like a tough girl, and then baseball got in there somehow.

4/7/16

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Fun_CityScoop

Studying in ballpoint from Jake Wyatt's post lately.

Environments aren't toorribly interesting to me, but it's not like I hate them. Backgrounds have actually been my bag, but I enjoy drawing them more as an OCD sort of pursuit of perfection, not so much for the sheer fun of drawing settings themselves. It's just a service to make the characters look better, and I love characters first and foremoist.

4/7/16

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Fun_USAUSAUSA

Found a photo of an old watercolor painting I did in '14, Fourth of July-themed.
I remember painting this in a Sukiya. I used to camp out there while eating the Mega Cheese Curry (thing is yuuuge), and after missing the last train home one night, I eventually discovered I could use that place as a sub-1000-yen hotel! Just buy whatever you want and you can literally spend the night there since it's open 24 hours! I later would use this sick tech during prerelease marathons rather than make the commute each day.

In fact, here's how you hack prerelease marathons in Tokyo: just hit the FNM leading right into the midnight prerelease (there's usually about an hour after FNM to eat at the local 7-11 or Family Mart before the midnight event), then jam the midnight until morning, then ride around and sleep on the train for a couple hours before the morning's Day 1 (I recommend getting onto the Tozai Line and riding that full circuit up and down since it will lap right back to Takadanobaba just in time), hit up the Saturday prerelease by no later than 30 min before doors, then when the day ends you pop over to Sukiya for a bite and a sleepover, get your boot back to the Sunday prerelease in the morning again by 30 prior, and then by the end of day 2 you're back on the train headed home like you just pulled off a heist. A reeking, stinky, sweaty heist. Don't forget to pack your infinitely futile Japanese deodorant. But it will do you no good, naive child.

Japanese deodorant burns and burns and burns, but it, like goggles, does nothing.

4/7/16

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Fun_BosniaHerzegovina

One of my favorite words is "Bosnia-Herzegovina," just based on of how Christina Ricci pronounced it in that one SNL skit forever ago. I had no idea what that skit's context was back then, I just remember how funny the word sounded to me as a kid. Now that I'm older, I'm pretty sure it was about some awful human-rights crimes or war or something...don't want to look it up.

Anyway, long story short, this is a fudepen study from neat photo I saw one time.

4/7/16

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Fun_TattoodTears

Just getting rid of this hideous thing. One of my least favorite drawings of recent memory, done for Inktober '15.

Not enough black ink in the world.

4/7/16

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Fun_Calt.JombieShroog

And our final of the joomby we colored in-store. How about that.

Slightly worried it'd have too much of a circus or calavera vibe, but I'd say we landed all right.

It was particularly fun digging in on this background, using the XP from the other Copic-based bg I did.

4/7/16

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Fun_Calt.JombieShroog_B

Fairly foolhardy, but I packed all my Copics into my backpack for the SOI prerelease weekend so I could color during down time. Ever since I've been able to read cards in Japanese, it's become less crucial for me to hardcore-memorize the set before the weekend, since I can just read the set over a couple times and then look over cards on the spot to refresh my memory.

Well, I got to the midnight prerelease too late for the FNM beforehand, so I had a couple hours to kill before the Midnight, so I got to work on coolering this joomby, coolored live at the midnight shoop.

4/7/16

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Fun_SpookySpoopid

Spooky spooky, stoopy stoopy stuff for SOI.

Spupid.

4/7/16

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Fun_Calt.AlphaSchmoOooo

And our second spirit finished from our SOI prerelease prep.

One of my opponents was way into this one.

4/6/16

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Fun_AgoraphobiaToday

Trying out a little drill from Jake Wyatt.

It's raining today, so I'm happy.

But I have to leave the house, so I'm sad.

Life is about balance.

At least that's what the Cliff's Notes say.

And sometimes I just want to skip to the end.

4/6/16

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Fun_PossibilitiesSunken

A sketch from the train to Tokyo for the SOI prerelease.

Never is always the motive.

4/6/16

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Fun_Saltines

And some digital design dressing because whatever. I was thinking of those old Shonen Jump volume covers.

That's my favorite card, but the way.

Vontec comes from my finger slipping trying to type context. Basically meaningless words, just wanted words that looked nice as images.

Blah blah blah.

4/6/16

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Fun_Saltines_B

And then some simple base colors for the sketch.

4/6/16

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Fun_Saltines_L

This was just some posing practice that kinda kept on going.

4/6/16

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Fun_Calt.JombieStressTest

Moar Joombiez for the SOI prerelease.

This looks so pleasing from across the table, all those lovely purples just chilling up the joint.

This was my first time drawing with Copics, too, I just live-inked the background right in there, running mostly on instinct. Really fun, such a novel way to think about drawing.

4/5/16

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Hare_WorldTraveler

An old, abandoned concept. Woulda been neat.

4/5/16

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Fun_TalesOfIchabodFae

This was a G-Pen live-ink for Inktober '15, vaguely horror/spooky-themed.

I like the noose tie, but it's probably played-out at this point, if we're being totally honest.

Anyway, I figure her name is Ichabod Fae, a descendant of Ichabod Crane. The first born always gets that name, but she's a girl, so she prefers to be called Fae. She handles odd jobs that invariably have some horrific, fantastical culprit behind them, but she manages to bring the best out in them.

Monsters are people, too.

It's the humans you need to worry about.

4/5/16

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Fun_Calt.TrianglesOoo

One of our spirit tokens from the SOI prerelease.

I really, really like how sharp the heavy blacks come through when you see this dooder on the table, and the stars really give it some kick.

Good idea, me!

4/5/16

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Fun_FlamerOnABrickWall

Inspired by a drawing I saw, but hoping to get a little looser with it.

The text is a stream of consciousness exercise with a little prompting for good measure.

It isn't meaningless.

Which is saying something.

4/5/16

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Fun_Busboy

Saw a kid sleeping on the train in the seat across from me one night and he looked like one of my old characters.

4/5/16

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Fun_GGgirl

Flipping through an old sketchbook and noticed an early take at a "gamer girl"-type character.
It's been a long-standing goal of mine to make a character like that, as in non-pandering, legit, etc. Gwen from Ben 10 is probably one of my favorite "nerd" female characters, which this design borrows from a bit, I feel. As a testament to how great she was, I forgot to write "female" just now in the previous sentence and had to add it in during editing, that's how unqualified and natural that "geeky" character felt.

That's what I aspire to, just make a killer character that anybody could relate to, but that girls in particular could feel happy with, even proud of. Guys have tons of representation everywhere obviously, so like adults, male characters don't really interest me in terms of being the "hero" of the story, stemming from that same principle that they don't really have the odds stacked against them, and if it's on a platter, who cares? Come to think of it, I believe I've only ever written one story where the "hero" was a male, but even that one was driven by the female character he encounters. And writing that felt only so exciting, since it's like, realistically, what's the worse that could happen? I guess that's why most of my male characters die in the end! That way it's like guaranteed that it doesn't work out for them later on.

Anyway, the nerd-girl character so often feels forced, which comes off like a massive disservice to everybody, especially anybody who could really use a character to look up to. I want girls to feel like going to play Magic or whatever is just like anything--listening to music, going to the movies, watching TV, whatever: it's just something one can do and have anywhere to a passive to intense interest in, but with no special qualifications or expectations involved.

It was a little bittersweet when Jackie Lee and Melissa DeTora went to Wizards because that meant two notable players just vanished from where perhaps they could really make the most impact on young players. Yes, making Magic is excellent and aspiration-inspiring, but there's no getting away from it not having the same profile as playing at the top level and showing people that anybody can become a great player. In fact, I couldn't name another female player, though I know there's that one Lands-In-Fronter, which I am morally opposed to. On balance, how many current R&D people can typical players name beyond Maro and say Aaron Forsythe? Of course Melissa DeTora is currently able to play again after her R&D run ended, but as I understand it she and Wizards seem to be looking to have her back on board again, so who knows how long she'll be someone you can hope to see slugging it out on the big stage?

In more practical terms of representation, if you read, "this electronics store's customers say this TV is a great buy," you would naturally assume a good portion, even 50% of these people were female. If you read "this MTG shop's customers say this sleeve is a great buy," you could realistically expect no females involved in that equation. That's brutal and sad. But I mean, it's entirely realistic.

I myself am a minority, in that I see almost no dark-skinned players anywhere, but I am male and I don't particularly identify with my own race, so on the whole I don't feel excluded or marginalized aside from being a non-Japanese person playing Japanese players in Japan. Yes, I feel dismissed or disregarded for being non-Japanese, but I know I can't possibly feel the sheer exclusivity and even fear or literal terror female players must endure at times.

If I'm being totally frank, I kinda hate playing Magic in Japan because too often Japanese players treat you like you aren't a human being for not being Japanese, and they play as robotic and silently as possible (but are all laughs, chit-chat, and sound effects every other round with other players). They behave as if you wouldn't understand a word should they bother to utter any customary narration of their moves. It makes playing and tracking things tedious, like we've both decided to do our taxes or read the phone book together in silence. Or more accurately, one is silent while the other half explains what page he's on as he flips through the literature, with the meaning clear enough through action and tone to effectively communicate in lieu of actual linguistic comprehension. It's annoying. But it's just annoying. I don't fear for my safety at any time from their off-putting behavior. I don't feel like I'm not allowed into the party, just merely not invited to dance.

I remember when I was little, my family stopped into some out-of-the-way rib shack or steakhouse and that was the first time in my generally race-neutral existence I felt weird or unsafe because of my skin color. The place was wall-to-wall white people and country music and good-old-boy garb. There was something in the air. I could feel people staring at us. I expected someone to ask us if we might enjoy eating elsewhere or getting one of those "Are we gonna have a problem here?" courtesies or something outlandish like that, that's how weird it felt in there. I felt queasy. But we ate our cooked cow parts in peace and left and never went back. I imagine that must be on the trajectory of what female gamers have to live with. We could go to any other steakhouse if we wanted to (and did) and have a better experience (and do), but how are you going to roll some dice and shuffle up some cards but from so many venues before you're out of viable options? Not saying that all, or even most shops are sludge, but when the world is so small, even small percentages of dud spots must magnify their negative, possibly irreversible impact on people.

Ultimately, it's sad that it's so cartoonishly rare to see girls in Magic shops. In my JP-lifetime, I've probably seen no more than a single-digit total of female players in Magic shops/venues in Japan, and I went to GP Chiba '15. I played this one girl in Hareruya one time, and I was struck with how cool, care-free, and comfortable she seemed to be, like she was just watching TV or at the movies. She was the only female in this mega-shop that holds 300 seats in its play space alone, not counting the population occupying the actual shop and office area of the floor space. I wish every female player could have that same aura of confidence and inclusion, especially if that is the one thing keeping them from heading out and enjoying gaming like anybody else, and I hope a character I make can contribute to that in some way. That would be incredible.

4/4/16

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Fun_Calt.JumbiWeft_L

Here's hoping Zombie Horrors catch on in SOI Standard.

I had this one laying around on my desk and decided to pack it for the SOI prerelease in case I needed any more zombie tokens (did). I didn't really think about the usefulness of the tokens earlier on, I was just drawing to test finer inks on tear alters, and in did this one in particular to test my horror live-ink skills.

4/4/16

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