An Old Friend

I revisited an old friend of mine today. I haven't drawn a decent picture of this guy in years, but Yukio is very dear to my heart. He looks scary, and he can be very scary, but he's a lot like a dog. A very loyal dog, willing and eager to serve. Without orders, Yukio will sit blankly on the floor, grinning at nothing.

He's very dear to me.

My poor, poor, brainless creature.

I promise, he's not as terrifying as he looks.

I haven't drawn him in so long because I felt his face shape was too similar to Rebel's- so this time when I tried to draw him, I decided I had to exaggerate how... wasted he would actually be. He hasn't exactly been 'alive' for many many years, he removed his soul as a young adult and stored it away in a vial he wears about his neck.  He doesn't take care of his body, everything functions on autopilot.

I pulled in his sallow cheeks, lengthened his fingers, removed some hair and reworked his nose and smile.

I find him more terrifying than adorable now, but I still see him as my emaciated, ugly puppy.

I forgot to post this last time I updated my blog because I was too tired!!

Sarah drew this for me in exchange for drawing her vampire character, Laurent.

Suffice to say, I was ecstatic.

Thank you Sarah, for drawing me such a pretty drawing of my lovely lovely Kara!

Annie

10:11

So Many Beautiful Drawings!!

Haha, I have so many pictures to post today, I don't know where to start! I usually try to keep on top of things, but I've been doing awful lately.

I've landed myself in a class where the instant someone get's bored it turns into "Do an art trade with me!" So I've been drawing and sketching and handing things out like mad and getting plenty of drawings in return!

It's fun.

It's also an exercise in drawing characters and people I don't know very well, which is great for commission work. Speaking of commissions, I gotta finish those anime girls...

Anyways! First up, some Tina. I'm also trying very hard to convince people to draw Tinette with their characters, but as it turns out all of my friends fear Tinette's wrath and wouldn't wish her unholy rage on any of their characters.

Oh come on, she get's along fine with Fray!

Psht, pussies.

I like seeing Tinette drawn by others! And besides, the only person she's ever actively beaten on was Lucas, and that has something to do with the fact that he shot her with a flintlock rifle. I'd beat on him too.

This particular drawing of Tina was drawn by Neilizza, a couple of days ago.

Next up, my baby Yukio, drawn by Stacy! Yukio doesn't get a lot of love. He's rather stupid and doesn't understand just about everything, but he's a sweetie at heart. If you can reach that heart.

He's changed a lot since his initial invention years ago- but his design is still very similar.

I just learned how to explain it better.

Kara get's some loving! Some loving not directly related to a particular cockney accented red-head or a kilt sportin' sexy man.

Just general fan love.

Kara get's appreciated because she isn't a skinny little twig; but I apparently gave Amanda a difficult time because Kara is an "in-betweener". She's not too skinny, or too fat, but is what normal people are supposed to look like.

Score!

I like Kara for that reason.

She's round and squishy and soft.

What's this? Some more straight up Kara.

Dalton drew this picture for me; he's got a really good, very cartoon network style, and I was thrilled he came over to join in all of our art trade fun!

Unfortunately I can't link to his blog or gallery, because I'm not sure where to find it. Tear.

Dalton's been working at drawing all of us in his style since last semester. I got the chance to lurk his sketchbook today, and we had a Star Trek vs Star Wars debate.

He actually doesn't like TNG-

HOW TOTALLY HEARTBREAKING!

I love TNG...

Whoops, I totally forgot to whiten the paper on this one-

Sarah drew this for me yesterday to celebrate Valentines. I came out of my shower and walked right past it and didn't notice till I sat down at my desk- and I found it hilarious.

They really don't make any sense, but somehow or another, angry plus angry equals harmony.

Or maybe just some really loud sex, I don't want to know.

The point is, they're 'getting along' and I really don't want to upset that balance because HEY, Tinette has a BOYFRIEND again, what is this nonsense?!

It's confusing. I'll leave it at that.

I love Leah's art. I suggested an art trade with her a little while ago, because even though I had portfolio's I was storing art in that people had given me, I only had two pictures from Leah. One was a disturbing pin up Suka, while the other was Tinette, inside of a spiral bound sketchbook.

She agreed, and I got the chance to draw GG. When I drew GG, I didn't have any reference, so I had to make it all up from my head- so when Leah was drawing Tinette, even though I offered her reference she refused, wanting to draw Tina from her head like I'd done for GG.

Tinette looks gorgeous and sexy; just sayin'.

These are some doodles from Chelsea's sketchbook! It's Suka, in purple, Sherry, and Sarah's character Asher.

Chelsea always loves my sweet and innocent characters, and then get's all heartbroken and upset when she realizes I plan to end their lives.

It's alright Chelsea, it's not too late for me to change my mind. Who knows, I just might.

The question is, would I be being crueler or no?

Dun dun dun.


And a final picture to close the day, something drawn by me, as my art blog needs a post from me- this is just a doodle I made after trying and struggling to draw an under weight Suka for the better part of lecture.

I am awful at drawing skinny people, yet my main character has an anxiety disorder and doesn't eat enough because she can't keep food down if she's feeling any kind of negative emotion, and she worries a lot.

I'm so smart.

Apparently I annoy my classmates because I draw myself too fat and always exaggerate my weight.

Man, I finally thought I'd gotten to the point where I could draw myself fairly.

Oh well. Going to finish this one up with some super fast colours so I can upload it as my new deviant ID. I probably shouldn't scream in Suka's face- I might give her a heart attack and she'll die.

Thank you everybody for all the beautiful artwork, I really appreciate it all!!!

11:53

Annie

Back in the Day, In a World Far Away

I finished my babies.

Once upon a time, these two were destined to be together. Unfortunately for them, I changed a lot of things as my story grew and evolved and got out of hand.

The way things went is that Suka's family was murdered by a demon when she was younger. Her mother, father, and brother. She escaped at the expense of her older brother, who gave his life to save his little sister.

Suka then escaped further demise by running away and ran into a traveling group of demon slayers (Just recalling all this makes me feel lame). She met a man she immediately attached to as a father figure (replaced now by Dr Verden). And so, Suka grew up, knowing how to beat the crap out of anything that crossed her path. She was seeking revenge for the death of her family, and hunting down the demon who did so. That demon was Eli, of course.

Along her journeys, she was commissioned to rid a village of a particular demon who was robbing their people of their souls, and parading their empty husks around like toys. There was a slight hitch; the demon she was hired to kill, wasn't a demon. Just a confused young man who'd removed and stored his soul away. Suka wasn't about to kill an actual human, so, she forcefully returned his soul to him; and this is how they met.

He wasn't exactly grateful or coherent after being restored, so Suka had to look after him until he was healthy again.

They got attached.

I was sitting at home, swamped in my homework, and I just started to think about it; and I really missed these two. I favoured the weak and pathetic Suka more than I did the strong willed and independent Suka, because one had much more room for character growth, and a much better ending. The only problem was that a weak and afraid Suka couldn't be with Yukio, because I couldn't get her to the point in the storyline where Yukio was waiting. Not on her own, not without help.

Besides, this Yukio was incredibly boring. He's like Rebel is right now; no emotions, no anything, not interesting.

But I do miss them, they were sweet hearts, back in the day.

I don't have a sensitive hand.

I decided to try my hand at digital inking today! Only because I was watching Xena and my hand was cramped up from doing nothing but drawing balloons all day.

I didn't finish; I mostly got my key frames drawn and I have a bazillion more to add. I tested it on Sarah's computer and it moves HILARIOUSLY fast, but, she's lookin' good. If hilariously fast.

To the right, I have a drawing of Suka and Yukio! They're my darling OC's and my original OTP that I had to break up because of conflicting personalities.

I'm only realizing it now, but goodness, I made Yukio monstrously tall. He's rather short, about my height I'd guess.

But anyways, this is a scene from an RP I'm in with my friend Tara. Yukio finds Suka pretty, and true to my original story, he kidnaps her. Obviously, she's not very okay with that, and faints. After Freak steals one of her eyes. What a jerk.

I kind of wish they still wound up together; but after I changed Suka's personality so she was the more frightened of my two Suka's- and after I took Yukio's personality and I made him more flamboyant and whiny and jaded, they couldn't have worked. I couldn't even get Suka to the part in the story where Yukio is because of her changed personality.

Call this an homage, to the original couple. I'm working on one of Alan and Suka, because I recently redesigned Alan as well. I'm still working on his personality; he's too goody-two-shoes for my tastes.

Annie

1:46

Multitasking Musings;

I've actually been doing pretty good with art recently. Just a lot of doodles, because I've been busy with work and fighting off a burnout (By the way, I very much succeeded).

But, between all that, I did find time to get some drawing in, though not a whole lot.

First, on the left I have a couple ballpoint pictures I coloured really quickly with my water colour brush. The first one is Suka, obviously, dressed up in different gear from what I normally give her. I started a new RP with my dear girl, and this one involves the Grecian storyline I made a couple of years ago specifically to do battle comics with.

Instead, I wound up using it for and RP, but the RP died because... Well, I don't know, it just died.

It's going quite well now and we're having a lot of fun, ha.

Ainmire and Kara as well, and they're both being used in the same RP. Kara and Suka are both currently being held hostage while Ainmire and Kerorphe are busy fighting for their lives in a giant labyrinth just jam packed of monsters, demi-gods, and idiots.

To the right, are Ninja and Suka!

Ninja was just a doodle I did when I was trying to get into drawing again; You can tell because my anatomy is bad, I didn't draw a shoe, she's leaning on nothing, and it looks kinda stupid.

Haha.

I never draw Rebel... Poor guy, he's been taking a lot of heat lately from my coworkers/friends.

Beside that, holy crap, it's Suka again!

I know.

This is a mock up for something I'm working on in the long run. I still have a lot of work to do, because after three drawings I still wasn't happy with this one.

Oh well!

I do have a great picture planned out, I just have to actually draw it.

Tada! Yukio and Ainmire.

I love drawing Yukio, and I miss my baby very much.

I sort of wish I could just skip to writing about him in my own story, but he's quite a ways off in my storyline.

He won't be as interesting after the fact, when he gets his soul returned... but that's alright, he's still my baby.

Besides, when he gets his soul back, he get's hilariously jaded and whiny and he acts a lot like... like... well I'm not sure, but it's humorously flamboyant.

Ainmire I just drew because at work we were discussing why kilts are so awesome on men, and why I had a character with a kilt in the first place. Eventually I'll be able to actually draw him as a like.. properly built dude.. but so far! The musculature is not happening.

One day.

His outfit used to be hilariously complicated. Now I've simplified it to a cape and a kilt and some fuzzy boots.

And this, is Suka, Tinette, and one little Yukio who got sat on.

It's also an account of my fight with the flies.

Oh, these were also drawn the night I didn't have any sleep at all.

So they make no sense.

Tinette and Yukio, what the hell, that never happens.

But the idea crossed my mind, I found it remotely funny (by remotely I mean I was killing myself laughing) and I decided to draw it.

Also, a curvy Tinette that was RIDICULOUSLY fat before I realized I was insane with sleep deprivation and redrew it.

And, a Suka, sitting on some sort of invisible surface!

I'm so awesome.

9:46

Annie

Or I Could Just Work on Brown Paper

Instead of constantly sticking it on paper stock.

But, I'm lazy; and I just didn't want to leave it on a white background.

I drew and painted this while watching Criminal Minds and Star Wars!

Yukio and Ninja don't actually ever cross paths, but I like pitting them against each other in pictures anyways.

Can you count all the bones I broke? Haha, Drawing in pencil wasn't working out very well, so I grabbed my ballpoint and went at it with that. I've gone on about how much I love ballpoint before, right?

I worked the sketch out in ballpoint and coloured it quickly with my water colour pencil crayons and my water brush. Nothing fancy, just playing around while I was avoiding my bedroom.

I also don't like it, because the poses (other than the fact that I snapped Ninja's neck) are static and boring, and not saying enough, as far as I'm concerned. I'll probably rework it at some point, but not tonight.

SO YAY FOR ME, DOODLEZ TIEM.

10:18

Annie

Open windows and Fans!

It's the time of year where things start to warm up, and people start to regret not having air conditioning.

Not that I'm overly bothered, I haven't had air conditioning in at least four years.

That's what fans are for!

I changed my shirt because it was too warm, and now I'm chilly.

I started this picture last thursday (not the one that just passed, the one before) Because I missed drawing my baby. I've been planning this picture for a long time, as I imagine the two of them wouldn't get on very well. Mostly because Yukio is out to destroy anything that moves and Ninja isn't afraid of anything.

Where's her brother, you ask? I don't know. I did some world splicing, and now Ninja is without her guardian angel. I was going to draw the background, and I went through a lot of options in my head... Originally, I was going to have it out in the forest, where Ninja's mother lives, but Yukio wouldn't make any sense in a scene like that. I then figured, well fine, I'll go for an older, more victorian feel, to match Yukio's clothing. Well, I couldn't get the right feel out of that either. So the entire week, I didn't have any clue what I was going to do for the background, until I got home, and it hit me.

If I wanted the background to fit both characters, it was going to have to be a grungier, darker, setting. Ninja is from a much more futuristic era, lots of metallic and unexplained neon glowing lights. I also wanted something Yukio would be used to, but I really didn't want to draw a victorian house.

Ah, what about a victorian cellar? Like the really freaky one in my house?

Alright, I wound up not having so much a victorian cellar as.. some kind of creepy dungeon, but it does seem like a likely place these two characters would run into each other. Spent the better half of today working on this, and it was a lot of fun. For once I didn't give up on a background forty minutes in; I kept working at it. And I like the results, I think. It looks a bit crappier full sized, but hey, it's an improvement, I'm working on it.

Annie

6:41

Halloween on Christmas

I'm going to be late for my... not.. really mine class. BUT I WILL LEAVE SHORTLY

Just flipping through my old sketchbook, I found some drawings I made for Halloween and couldn't finish because I left the sketchbook at home. That being the case, here I have the two drawings.

This is Tinette! Duh. It was the first one I really liked and set me off on a huge spiel of Halloween pictures. I'm only posting my two favourites though, so yeah.

Tinette!

I like the black and white, but here's a link to the coloured flats!

Of course she's a playboy bunny. It suits her perfectly! She'd have no problem wearing that to a party. She's just awesome like that.

Neeeext:
Yukio. I love this guys character, but like hell I have any idea what's going on with my lines in its black and white like this...

I picked my practically zombie character and made him a zombie for Halloween. I'm so creative. fail.

So originally I had about four of these, but I like these two the best. Originally, I was going to come home and spend Halloween painting, so I could have them up in time to celebrate. Originally, each of the characters was going to have a certain pallet for the base. Yukio's was probably going to involve a lot of blues, greens, and yellows, while Tinettes was going to involve a lot of reds, oranges, yellows... They were going to be very very different, despite me using the same base for both. I had a hell of a lot of fun drawing the base, but by the time I was finished, my hand was cramping insanely and I could hardly move it. But still, I enjoyed myself and got carried away with details, and had I gotten the chance to paint them, they would have turned out awesomely.

I have to run now, I'm going to be late.

Tata!

It's All a Process!

I finished that picture of Yukio I was working on yesterday. I had a lot of fun, even if the background was super lame and made up on the spot. My roommate Leah says it reminds her of Christmas, and that this is Yukio celebrating Christmas time magic!

I'm sure that's the case.

It looks a little strange on my LCD monitor, but I'm still okay with it. As I predicted, even though there are some elements that bother me, like the fact that his head is too large and his vest looks a little odd (but I fixed it up a bit on photoshop so I liked it a little more) I am happy with it.

I forgot, however, to cover him in oodles and oodles of mud! Oh noes! This is an example of his better taken care of clothes; even if his vest clearly can't function the way it was meant to.

I quite like his boots!

Still fooling around with different techniques to cleaning up my line art. I think I like the way I was doing earlier, just erasing the red lines in my sketchbook so they're fainter, and then scanning in the image as black and white. Just by making the red lines fainter, the scanner fails to pick them up. Only thing I don't like about that technique is that the lines are rough and pixely. Not that you can tell when I downsize the image, but I can see it while I'm working and it just eats away at me.

This time around I scanned it in as a colour and removed the red channel and did clean up work and all that bull, and I still had spotty remains of my red lines left behind. You shouldn't be able to see them from the smaller image, but I could see them while I was zoomed in colouring in the flats.

Next time I scan in colour, I'm going to try the method I used to remove my blue lines; I'm going to use the hue/saturation slider and work with the magenta's, red's and whatever other sliders I have to use and see if I prefer that method or not.

Problem I have with those two techniques (with blue, or red, or whatever other colour I use) is that my lines are ever so slightly translucent, and you can see when I colour underneath them, especially with lighter colours like flesh tones, or whites and yellows. I think I can get around that by working with the curves slider though, so I'm going to experiment with that too, I think.

It's all a process right? Just need to figure out which of the many techniques I want to use! I would like to eventually learn to ink directly in photoshop with my tablet, but as of yet, I haven't figured out a way of doing that I like. Other than the pen tool, which I'm very practiced in and would like to step away from. I sort of like inking things in my sketchbook anyways, as it's something I was never very good at until about halfway through the summer where I started making a point of inking everything.

It's all a process!

It's A Bit Like A Mirror, I guess

A little over a month ago, my friend Ksenia asked me if Suka shared any of my personality traits. I thought about it.. and I thought about it.. and I suppose in a way, she does. Of course, it wasn't until I was walking home from the bus stop with a bag of veggies in the crook of my arm, I was thinking about how I always wind up drawing Suka holding her basket in the same manner.

And that is where this idea came from!

In a way, Suka is everything I want to be, and at the same time everything I never want to be. She's very sweet and kind, and no matter what, her primary concern is always those around her. A trait I wish I could pick up on. She also doesn't complain much, while I on the other hand, complain ceaselessly. It's another one of those things I wish I could just steal from my OC. She's also very subdued and quiet, while I'm loud and bright. Yet, we both don't like strangers or being in crowded spaces, or trying to make friends, and we don't like bugs, yes, we both hate bugs. Suka is also insanely needy and very tactful because she's afraid of angering people. I am stupidly blunt at times (It leads to unpleasantries between friends) and I'm not needy.

We both share the trait that in a stressful situation, we can both keep our heads until all reason for panic is gone, and then we break down and bawl. In some ways that's good, in other ways, not so much.

Here's a preview to the painting I'm working on right now. It's Yukio, again, because for the past two weeks I've had amazing life drawing models who have the most amazing, twisted, almost impossible looking poses, and everyone I drew I was like... Goddamn, these poses are so perfect for Yukio!!

And then I came home and drew him just walking around all happy like. I've already inked this, and laid down the flats, and NOW I'm noticing things I don't like (his head is too big, his vest ((which isn't in the lines to the left)) looks awkward on his body, and just a few other things) But I think when I'm finished painting it, I'll quite like it.

I like it already, because it just has Yukio's air too it, without me having to completely distort his body and make him stand pigeon toed awkwardly like I normally draw him. Not that I don't like those, it's just fun to draw him actually in action for once.

Ah yes, Yukio can use magic. Did I ever mention that? It was a concept I threw around on his creation- Warning, hyperlink leads to super super old badly drawn image - Where becoming the Soul Puppeteer, opened his body to be a vessel for all kinds of dark energies; which of course, he learned how to harness. Even after his soul gets returned to him, he is still capable of accessing these dark powers, but he doesn't like to use them because they're a reminder of a past he forcefully left behind.

I'm enjoying this image! Going to go continue painting now.

Look, It's A Jacket!

Yukio doesn't normally wear jackets because he can't get them over his arm. Looks like hes found a way around that little problem! Can't imagine his coat being very useful, all pinned up to his shoulder like that...

I've already gushed about as much as I could about how much I love Yukio and how much I love drawing him, but in light of the new RP... I GET TO DRAW HIM AGAIN!!! Muahhahahahaha. I was going to just use my old drawing, but I realized I couldn't because I coloured Ninja and Tinette in a completely different style than the second last picture I drew of this guy.

Coming up with poses that scream "Unstable" are very very hard; this is my latest attempt. You'll notice his legs are in the same position they were last time, with the toes pointed in. He walked a bit like a broken puppet, with twitchy awkward movements and occasional shuffling of feet. His clothes get torn to shit and he doesn't notice, often gets wounded and doesn't notice.. and he's right now covered in blood that isn't his, but belongs to someone else he recently dispatched.

In his defense, he's not really sane. He's still human under all of that! Somewhere.

I didn't draw his weapon again! Ooopsie, though actually I thought about that. Normally his weapon (Which is a blade split down the middle) attaches to his wrist, acting as a further extension to the modification of his arm. On consideration, it's a highly ineffective way to have a weapon, permanently fixed to your hand; and he's right handed anyways, meaning he fights with his weaker hand--

I made it detachable! And he's extremely proud of it.

I don't have any marvelous stories for today! I didn't crash my bike, or get hit by a car, or lose my homework, or even so much trip up a set of stairs.

I think today is going quite well!

My parents are back from Rome. Dad called me yesterday and woke me up from my afternoon nap to ask me how I was doing, and I told him I got hit by a car. He seemed baffled before asking, "How did you get hit by a car!?" Though I bet he hung up the phone and had a good chuckle at it. Only me, right?

Oh yeah, dad called me in the middle of my lecture, where my phone went off and scared the holy bejeebers out of me. I promptly tried to text him to tell him to stop calling, and he called again! Brilliant. My mom wanted to come and visit me tomorrow, but I had to take a raincheck on that because tomorrow I'm going to see the Dead Sea Scrolls tomorrow at the ROM with my friend Sarah and her family. I'm excited! And need to print off that ticket...

Anyways, I'm long overdue for a nap, so I'm going to crash now.

Just a dash of madness

Ta dum! Alright, so I've finished.. Two of four. I didn't colour his little alternate costumes this time around, because I wasn't very fond of them.

I LOVE this character; I love the inbalanced way he stands and the fact that he doesn't understand the way he interacts with the physical world.

He's not technically human anymore, and not technically alive either.. He's got a pulse and needs to eat occasionally so his body doesn't just.. rot and fall off his bones. Though I imagine that would be awesome...

I decided to add some streaks of gray to his hair to help enhance the whole.. 'Crazy' motif.

So, Yukio is awesome. He doesn't really understand the plane of the physical, and walks with this... shuffling gait, like a poorly manned puppet. He has no soul because he removed it years ago and stored it in a little phial he wears around his neck to protect him from his own dark practices. He rarely expresses emotions past anger, confusion, and psychotic happiness. He's mental capacity is much that of a child, and a LOT of things confuse him. He cuts his own hair, but.. he doesn't understand how scissors work, so his hair is very messy and asymetrical. He also stitches closed his own wounds and repairs his own clothes, but lacks the understanding on how to.. well work a needle and thread.

He makes these adorably creepy rag dolls to store peoples souls in when he removes them, because he's awesome like that. Wears SUPER high pants, and his clothes are all very old, and if he looked after them, they would be very nice. As you can see though, it's been many.. many years since Yukio considered changing his clothes. He doesn't UNDERSTAND 8D.

I love Yukio and need an excuse to RP him at some point or another.. Just as a side character though, he needs someone to keep him in check, as he doesn't realize when he's hurting people or doing things that could have disastrous consequences to himself or others...

Suka DOES miraculously manage to return his soul to him (somehow in the panic of almost dying, she releases it by shattering his little glowy phial) and he gets a little more.. Human.

In the ORIGINAL of my story, it was Yukio who fell in love with Suka and vice versa. Yukio went after her to save her when Eli kidnapped her and all that fun stuff, but I couldn't keep it. I couldn't keep it because Suka didn't have the backbone to carry on as she did up until she met Yukio.. It's a shock and a half that she has the guts to save herself by snatching and shattering his phial. So sadly.. Yukio had to take a step down and be a side character, and I had to invent a male lead who could BE there for Suka up until he gets his chance to cameo. He has a role, yes, but his original role was much, much bigger.

Oh right, I moved out. I'm now living with my fellow artists and classmates in a townhouse in Toronto. I'm still upset I didn't get into animation, but the excitement of the courses I'm going to be taking has overshadowed it to the point where I don't get.. TOO upset anymore.

I'm going to go play with my baby and see if the art jam is set to go yet or not!

A few drawings I have yet to colour

The one with actual real dark black lines.. was done with my new scanner 8D

Muahahahahaha, I'm SO glad I made that upgrade.

Kay, so just some doodles before I head off for a weekend of scavenger hunting and waiting in long line ups to collect autographs for friends of mine!

My least favourite of this set of four is Ainmire. I don't know why, but I just didn't like it as much as the other three..

These are all characters from my original story Timestamp; Ainmire, Tinette, Suka and Yukio. So far I haven't decided if Tinette is going to be in my actual story or not, but I quite enjoy her attitude and I love her hair... So I figured I'd stick her in the line up and decide if I wanted to keep her later or not! You've already seen Suka and Yukio, so I won't bore you too long with my endless chatter... I plan to draw Kara next =3

Yes, I'm obviously avoiding the male lead, whose name I have changed fifty gajillion times and needs a decent redesign done.... I don't know him well enough yet, I have to make the effort.

They aren't coloured yet, but don't worry! Colour is coming!! Just been busy and frazzled.

I'm having a rather nasty week, still stressing over finishing my packing, went two nights without my computer (I know it sounds horribly sad, but when the rest of my life is shoved in boxes I literally had NOTHING to do) and wound up staring at my ceiling and falling asleep super early both nights (I attempted to replace my computer with my Ipod but it didn't work), my blue folder went missing sometime two nights ago, and I realized I'm actually highly dependent on my notepad for writing down anything and everything that comes to mind and I feel completely lost without it. I'm concerned over Swazzle, though it's probably nothing major and more than likely me being overly worried because I haven't owned a rat in almost eight years; Fan Expo is tomorrow and I'm thrilled yet HOLY SHIT SO MUCH IS HAPPENING!!! At the same time.

Tomorrow is my last day of work. No painting, just classroom work, so I can wear nice clothes. I'm following Alysia part of the way home on the buses and she's going to direct me where to go from there and then I'm going to catch the subway to meet my friends at Union Station. The entire trip is going to take hours, but only cost me six dollars.

I'm incredibly excited for the weekend, even though I'm going to be doing very very very little shopping for myself (I don't have a lot of money and I'd rather spend it on things for my friends anyways); though I am going to get at least one commission of Ainmire.. because I love him and he needs more love!!! As much as he hates it. STOP BEING SO ANGRY, AIN!

I'll be back Monday, don't expect anything new before then!

Annie

A new addition to the family

Alright, so despite my decision about taking my time and saving up before I bought myself pet rats; needing a new cage, money in case of health issues, money for supplies, for food, for bedding for.. everything

I went to the pet store and I bought a baby rat today. She's a little tiny thing, hardly any longer than my middle finger, roughly five weeks old and a dumbo rat with adorably large ears.

I was with Stephanie and we were picking up her little sister, Kate, from work. Of course we ran inside to have a look at all the animals, and we were talking about the rats when Kate came up and said she had a rat in the back, and asked us if we wanted to see. I wanted to hold the baby, so I agreed enthusiastically.

Steph had just asked me if I planned to buy rats when I moved out.. My answer was, "No, I'm going to adopt a pair when I have the money to do so and look after them properly,"

Kate vanished into the back and came out again with a little rat in a blue cage...

She'd hidden her in the back because she was supposed to be feeder. I couldn't, in my right mind, leave her there in the store... So I called my mother. Mom was not happy at all, and wound up hanging up on me. I still couldn't leave her behind, so I paid for a hampster starter kit and I paid for the rat baby and brought her home.

Mom was ingnoring me, dad was unhappy, and I have this horrid feeling I'm going to be shanked in my sleep. I instantly had to ask my friend Sarah for help; I am not equipt to handle long term rat care at the moment, and I needed advice on my next move to make.

We've decided we're going to introduce my girl (Swazzle) to her girls (Blimey and Zooks) after we move in together, in just under two weeks. I collected advice on what to feed her, threw away the pine shavings and stole two of our older towels to be used for bedding. I gave her cardboard toilet tubes and crumpled paper, and cotton fuzz, and a hammock and she's now sitting in a very tiny cage beside my bed.

I'm stupidly, ridiculously happy to have a baby again. I was on the verge of tears earlier because it just feels so wonderful to have a rat again-- and I missed my baby Archie so much. I feel bad that for the next two weeks she's in such a tiny little cage and is alone; but she's not going to be eaten by some larger animal now.

I had her out and was letting her run around on my bed, talking to her and just.. feeling wonderful, but she began to slow down and tuckered herself out; so I put her in her cage.

I am.. extremely glad; I feel amazing and I love this girl so much I could and probably will cry over it at some point. I don't regret my purchase at all, and I am excited to introduce her to the girls!

G'night Swaz! I will see you come morning, on my bedside table.

Drawing to the left is a doodle of my character Yukio, which I drew very much of today and will eventually post the finished work.

"Straying into things you shouldn't"

WEE!!!

That was awesome fun.

Anyways, Once again I picked up my long since stuffed away character, and decided to doodle him.

While i was painting, his palette slowly became pretty much white and blue (he started with pigmentation in the skin, really) And I'm happy with the results.

"I'm working on a new doll.. would you like to see it?"

I had to think about it for a while while I was painting his chest, because.. Originally (Ack, I forgot his soul again @_@) I realized, Yukio would have to be wasted to virtually nothing. He is technically no longer in control of his body, therefore neglects it, but.. well I didn't feel like turning him into a skeleton. Skinny, yes, skeletal.. no.

So I thought about it and I figured.. Even if he doesn't have a soul, it doesn't mean he isn't in control of his body. Granted, his awareness of his connection to his physical being is probably a bit.. messed up, but he'd still have survival mode, and therefore eat enough to keep his body going. Probably looks a lot like Gollum and his fish friends but.. He does eat. Meaning when he gets his soul back, he won't be returning to a dead body. Neglected and badly needing attention/nourishment, but alive.

I've decided he's going to play a part in my story. Not a very huge role, but.. well, he doesn't deserve to rot in my file folder for eternity. He's a pretty awesome character!

Oh, the doll...

Right, how to explain this.. Yukio is something of a serial killer. Only, he doesn't work on the physical plane, more on the spiritual one. He never ACTUALLY kills anyone.He's a practitioner of the dark arts (which are sort of.. illegal), and is capable of removing a persons soul and storing it in another object. He then is able to control the empty vessel left behind. He makes dolls of all his chosen victims, and stores the soul inside the doll. A "Soul Puppeteer" if you will =] I had to come up with some kind of creepy trademark x3

That's also what he did to himself, because the process is a little risky, as you risk accidentally removing your own soul in the process. So, he decided to get the jump on the disadvantages, and removed his own soul, storing it in a little glass vial he wears around his neck (that I keep forgetting to draw). Close enough he's still connected, but now safe from harms way 8D

His reasons for choosing such a life are his own and not mine to divulge >...>

No interesting story for today, except I made dinner and lemonade and pie. ALRIGHT <3

From the Grave

I present... Yukio 8D A character who up until I invented Ain, was my favorite OC I'd ever made. I struggled like hell to draw him because.. I completely forgot what he looked like.

Anywho, this is Yukio, character with a half assed japanese name who found himself the subject of ALL of my creative writing pieces for grade twelve. And if it wasn't him, it was Viktor. With a K. Cause I'm awesome with names like that.

I can't remember his backstory at the moment, except that it was extremely traumatizing, and he killed his dad. And lots of other people. And he's crazy. Very crazy. As in I-DON'T-KNOW-WHO-THE-HELL-I-AM crazy.

I think his backstory needs some work >< I went from really high pants and boots to a kilt and cape... Did I mention Yukio occasionally wears heels? Yeah, he does that just cause he can.

I think I called him Yukio because on scouring endless baby names sites (and being the ... animu.. loser I was.. it HAD to be Japanese), his name translated to "Get's what he wants" which I found ironic because.. Yukio never gets what he wants.

But I can't flippin' remember what he wanted =_= creation fail. *struggles to remember backstory*

Well I had fun to say the least! I haven't drawn him seriously since... since.... at least since september. I think he lost some weight... Couldn't possibly be that I've gotten better at drawing skinny people :P After all, being in a state where you aren't technically in control of your body and not eating for a few years MIGHT have something to do with it.

Fack, he shouldn't even be ALIVE.. dumb properties.. of soul.. oh piss I forgot his soul XD he wears it in a little vial around his neck :B

... Wow, this sounds more and more retarded the more I type.

I used to draw him all the time, because having absolutely flipped his lid, I could draw him in whatever pose I picked, and if someone questioned the awkwardness of a pose, I'd laugh and say, "He can do it, he's crazy!" Cause insanity justifies everything. Riiiiight.

Ah Yukio.. I need to get the dust brushed off you.. You can keep your wapanese name, but I very badly need to iron out the rest of your story =/

*snort* HAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHA don't you just love old drawings? Had to go sifting through my storaged DA gallery for this...