Taelifoe Ref Sheet

Okay, so maybe I'm a little insane, but I'm reeeeally happy to have gotten this done today. I've been thinking for a while that I needed a new reference sheet for my avatar (which technically is not named "Taelifoe") since the last ref sheet I did went bye-bye when my old laptop crashed....again. I don't know why I didn't back that file up. I guess I didn't think it was very important.

I used a trick during the inking of this that I picked up off of another artist named NeonDragon. When you are marking paths with the Path tool in Gimp, you'll see an option on the left menu called "Stroke Path". What this does is to open a dialogue box that allows you to select a line thickness and color, and after you've hit OK, it will create a nice solid line along your paths. You can erase the ends of the lines so that they have a tapered look. Since my hands shake a lot, this has been incredibly helpful to me when inking long lines.

Oh boy does my hand hurt. I about pushed it to the limit getting this sketched, inked, colored and put together today. My theory of "practice helps!" is still holding, too. Wasn't nearly as hard to sketch out my avvy this time as it has been in the past. Hurray! Done in 5 hours in Gimp......I think :P

Red

Had a little bit of trouble finding a red photo I liked. Surprisingly, this is one of my older ones. Camera used was a Canon Powershot S30.

Mugshots

Fun project I've been working on the last few days. These are creatures from my fantasy series. I seem to draw a lot of the lore drakes, so everyone knows what they look like. I thought it might be nice to give some attention to some of the other races.

From top to bottom: Troll, Neth, Amanagir.

The bottom one is based off of the armadillo lizard, a species that has some pretty cool scales that look like armor. Unfortunately, the ridges on the neck look more like wrinkles to me. Bleh.

The middle one was pretty fun (and fast!) It's not based off of any newt species that I know of. I just had a lot of fun giving him a toxic, glowy look. I used the Neon effect to accomplish this, which can be found by going to Filters, Alpha to Logo, and then Neon. If you want the glow effect without erasing details on the original layer, I recommend duplicating your layer and then applying the Neon effect to the bottom of the two.

The top one has war paint, yay. I briefly looked up pictures of Native American war paint styles to get a feel for the look, then um.....just did my own :)

Each time I draw one of these, I get a little better and a little faster. Practice helps!

Purple

If you can guess the flower, I'll give you a cookie (or just eat one for you)

Blue and Buttons

Another photo! I'd like to do a rainbow of these, so the next in line would be purple (yep, I started at green)

I decided to try putting some of my art on a couple of buttons, finally. I've been wanting to for a while, but couldn't really find drawings that I liked enough to go through with it. The second picture shows my first-ever buttons, and I love them! They're a little smaller than I thought (about one inch) but it's still pretty cool to have something like this. The resources available through the internet still astound me.


I'm kicking around the idea of holding a little giveaway over at Outskirts of Gaia with buttons like these for prizes. If I feel I can garner enough interest for such a thing, I think it would be fun to do :)

Guardian of the Dawn

Whew, I wasn't sure if I'd finish this one tonight! This is a redraw of an earlier thumbnail that I did. I tried to fix some things that were bugging me on the first version, but it wasn't working how I wanted it to. So to save time (and sanity) I drew a second version, and I have to say I like this one quite a bit. This is my first stab at an illustration kind of look. I'm not sure if the character is coming out of his boundaries enough to stand out or not, if that makes sense. Blah :\

The character in this picture is a deity from my Legends of Destiny, or at least his "mortal" form. He is associated with the god of fire, hence his relation to the dawn. I actually picture him with more dark rainbow colors to his wings, but I took the suggestion of a friend to use rainbow macaw wings as a reference. I think they look nice this way (though in my head they will always have notes of purple and darker blues and reds)

His wings are supposed to be much larger, too, but I can only make them so big. Phooh.

ANYway, I dropped a solid black layer on this one and then adjusted its properties in order to get a lot of the shadows. I've used this method before and I like it a lot. If you want to play with this yourself, you can find the option in your toolbox that displays the layers (it defaults to the right side of the screen) You'll find a place near the top where it says "Layers" - click the drop-down menu that says "Mode" right under it. Have fun!

Green

Should I put up any photography? Well, I guess I kind of am here. I've never claimed to be a professional, but I do like to play with a camera.

This is one of the many that just tickles something happy in me. I love macro, and I love bright eye candy. Camera used was my Canon PowerShot SD950 IS. Excellent camera.

Happy New Year!

Well, 2011 came in snowy and cold, and I'm glad that I now have Spring to look forward to. There's something rejuvenating and calming to me about the first four or five months of the year.

Anyway, I wanted to stick something really cool on here for New Year's Day, but the picture I'm working on isn't ready yet. I tried to do something else that was spiffy, but it didn't work out, either. So, I now present you with my latest masterpiece, complete with erm.....bragging ;) I know, I know, I'm so talented, aren't I?

(If you're only interested in the artsy stuff, you can stop reading here)

Man I have been so tired lately. I've tried vitamins, iron supplements, different amounts of sleep, and I am always tired. It's kind of discouraging when you want to do so many things and you can't because you're feeling drained, especially when you don't know why. Some days are better than others, thankfully. My mom is pretty convinced I have Chronic Fatigue Syndrome. At this point, I wouldn't doubt it, but I don't know for sure. I just felt I had to whine a little, since there's so much I'd like to be doing artistically and with my writing .... seriously, I am so behind on the current book. It's going to be a battle to get it done, but I'm far from giving up, huzzah!

I was very fortunate to get some soap making supplies for Christmas, too. I'm looking forward to trying them out (I love making things with my hands) but I need to get some kitchen equipment, first. I'll post a picture as soon as I get an end result, but in the meantime, I hope everyone has had a happy and safe New Year. Here's to another 365 days full of family, friends, personal growth and, of course, fun!