My Newest Venture

Are you familiar with the story of the Frog Prince? Well, too bad. This is almost nothing like that. There is a princess, she has a golden ball and she's friends with a frog named pretzel. Similarity ends there. Pretzel isn't even sure if he is just an enchanted frog or an actual enchanted prince.


There's also that little matter of reclaiming Princess Jean's stolen kingdom . . .

Pretzel and the Princess: Part 1

Everyone, this is Pretzel and the Princess. Princess Jean and her best friend, Pretzel. Is he an enchanted prince? Or an enchanted frog? Will they be able to regain her kingdom from Princess Jean's wicked sisters? You (and I) will find out the answers as I continue my attempts at creating a comic.

Spring Break

Spring Break is over and done with.

My plans for Spring break were simple and undemanding. I was to remain on campus, do a bit of homework, photograph my paintings, and get some serious painting and ceramic work done. Of course, it was not to be.

It would seem that no one is allowed to remain on campus during Spring break anymore due to problems last year. Naturally, I did not know this. There was a letter sent out on Monday (four days notice) informing us of such. Unless we're expecting mail no one checks their mail, so I had no idea about this until I overheard someone else talking about in the cafeteria. Even if I had got the letter that would have been only Four. Days. Notice.

So, with no notice whatsoever I had to fine a place to go. Small problem. I got to school in Kansas. I live in California. ARGH. At this late date my friends have already made plans and there was no room in them for me so I spend this afternoon begging Student Life to let me stay. No dice. Instead, I have to have my parents find me a flight back to California by Monday. A very expensive flight, thanks to the short notice. Never, NEVER try to find a flight during Spring break.

Yea verily I am frustrated. A flight was finally hunted down at a ridiculously high cost and I spent a nice few days at home, getting nothing done but a few comics and a bit of reading. Watched a lot of CSI shows. There are so many of those shows.

Oh a brighter note, my mom made me an In Joke T-Shirt. Which really rocks. She put the banner from my In Joke blog for it. Now my friends want some with their characters on them. I'll post the t-shirt designs on The In Joke blog. (theinjoke.blogspot.com)

And There Was Much Rejoicing

What once was lost is now found!
My laptop has returned unto me! It returned to me this afternoon and now sits on the kitchen table, eager for its hard drive to be reinstalled so it can once again join me in my varied and amusing Internet adventures.
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In other news, I return to school on Sunday. I'm ready to head back and see my friends, plan a meal for everyone, and threaten them with knives. I'll pop in the fireplace DVD and we'll all gather around the flickering digital flames and discuss what has come to pass since we last gathered.
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What's with the picture accompanying this post, you ask? Not sure. I'm feeling cheerful and that picture just made me feel satisfied, contented and all warm and fuzzy inside. Looking at it, I realize that I now need to mark any new pictures as copyrighted in 2010, rather than 2009, as I have been doing. Now, to the bat cave! I must prepare for my next glorious, action-packed adventure!

Lonely

So, this past semester I dropped my computer and the flash drive ports on one side got all mashed up and unusable. Then my disc drive doesn't read any CDs I put in it. So now it's been sent off for repairs. The hard drive is still with me, but the rest of it is on the way to some distant land of computer tech support.

I . . . miss it.

Here's hoping it shows up in time, that is, before I get on the plane, schoolward bound. If it arrives after me, then my parents will have to send it on and it'll take days to get there and I will be without my dearly cherished laptop.

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Saw the trailer for Iron Man 2. I really, really want it to be May right now. If it were May then the movie would be out and I would have watched it twice.

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Obviously not much is going on right now, and this is a lackluster post. I suppose I'm not feeling very upbeat right now. You know, just general despair about life and art. Lack of people to talk to, away from my friends. Blah, blah, blah. The general mixed blessings of breaks from school. Sure, no class or homework, but no friends, movie nights or making dinner for a crowd. I'll go eat some of those Christmas chocolates and cheer up.

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That reminds me, Merry Christmas! And Happy New Year! Hope your holidays were enjoyable and that the coming year is even better than the last.

Meet My Friends

The imaginary ones, anyway. I've been doing some drawings of characters from the stories I write, and I thought they're turning out rather well. Keep in mind, these are all works in progress and not yet completed.

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First off, this is Vanessa Lynn.

She's friendly, I swear! Sixteen years old and a powerful sorceress, she is a supporting character in one of my stories. The story is going through a big overhaul right now, so it doesn't have a title at this time. Obviously a fantasy, hopefully an original one.

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This guy is called Matthew from the story, "Overdue". Which, by the way, exists in the same world as Vanessa's story.

Man, he doesn't look very friendly either. He's usually much more cheerful and snarky, and lots of fun to be around. He lives in the mountains and has a fascinating back story which I won't tell you about because it would give away all the twists.

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Now, for someone who actually looks cheerful, Andrew Furlen.

He's a wizard in my story, "Silent Stone". He has a rather deadpan sense of humor and usually pretends to be vague and unfocused so people won't bother him.

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Meet Gray, The Gatekeeper,

Also from "Silent Stone", he is a personification of the magical protection of the palace. He was created centuries ago and then someone lost the user manual, apparently, so not much is know about him or how he works. He is programed to intervene if the royal family or the other palace inhabitants are in immediate danger, but not until then.

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He's not Asian, by the way, I'm just trying out a kimono sort of outfit, trying to get a balance between them and the usual wizard's robes. And maybe give him a hat.

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So, how am I doing?

Something Different

It has been some time since I posted anything to do with my digital coloring and I might as well, since I have improved significantly in the intervening time.
First off, here is a picture I use as my ID online. Ignore the text, it isn't important and needs to be updated.

It's supposed to be a skin-like mask that makes the face look somewhat blank, but still have hints of the features underneath. It's rather fun to color. Here's another example of the same character:

I really liked how this one turned out (above), I think the face looks good and the hands aren't too bad either. I used to avoid drawing hands, so I always feel satisfied when my character has both hands showing and in fairly believable poses.

Now, for a bit of a dynamic piece:

These are all my original character, Currer Bell. He's not meant to be an author avatar of any sort, he's just fun to draw. At the moment most of my completed pictures are of Currer Bell, or of my sister's original character, Jay:

Or sometimes both of them together:

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These pictures are drawn by hand, scanned into the computer, then colored in photoshop. I've been doing this for about six months and having much fun.