Sketchy FINAL Sanity....

Yep, am deep in my final now... yes, I managed to come up with a script, and it looks like it just may continue... hopefully it will be received well enough to make it worth my effort.

Will be blogging here as I wait for renders... (almost finished with basic renders for the first 3 pages of the final)...

Now... the first 3 or 4 pages (whichever I finish up for the final) - will NOT be the official first 4 pages of this endeavor... I'd like to consider them a test run & a teaser for the real thing. I'm planning on setting the scenes up better, importing into Vue, etc.... all so I can have some nice color. *chuckles*

I also have plans for the background of each page... making it look like parchment, burned... old... whatever.

Ohhh, I suppose it would help to have a plotline... or at least a synopsis of the story...

Thera Lycoris... which means "The Unmastered Twilight" - is a place between the worlds, on the other side of the Mists of Time and Space. People have been known to wander in... and never return to their home worlds. Others come back quickly, either screaming uncontrollably, semi-comatose, or having gone completely insane. The Mists play upon your mind... and prey upon your imagination.

Thera Lycoris has become home to a variety of creatures, with Dragons and Humans the two dominant species. Trolls; Faeries; Demons & Imps; Weres - canine, feline, equine, reptilian, aviary; pixies; nymphs; satyrs; goblins; giant arachnids that live amongst the tree-peoples; etc also make their homes within the large realm.

The Dragons are currently ruled by the Dowager Queen Mother; She Who Has Ruled Fairly (for about 1,500 years)... but she ages, and wishes to have her replacement ready before she passes into the Realm of Eternal Sleep.

When her son's mate laid a rather large egg shaded gold and ruby, speculation stirred that this was the long-awaited princess. Unfortunately, the egg was stolen before it could age enough to be examined closer. Hope holds out that the egg is still viable; meanwhile, DragonWhite and his mate are attempting to create a second egg. Adventurers, mercenaries and treasure seekers are all searching for the missing egg - most for the rather large reward, very few because they simply wish to help.

Meanwhile, trouble is brewing. Drakna, the dragon who stands to become queen should a princess not be born to the royal line, has escalated her attacks on the outlying human settlements. Her henchmen, led by the Knight-turned-Mercenary-Assassin Nox at least leaves the children, but kills all the men and woman over the age of 16. Unfortunately, this has caused a surge in the number of human orphans, and the orphanages can no longer keep up.

And this... is where our story begins. A missing Egg, escalating problems, and adventurers/treasure-seekers combing every nook and cranny.

Ok... here's a copy of my character sheet. This is where I keep all kinds of notes on my characters - for instance, if they say they prefer the color blue over the color purple, then I make note of that. I can't stand story-lines where there are glaring inconsistencies.

Thera Lycoris: The Unmastered Twilight

Character Sheet:


Pensri - feline-human mixture, unsure of her past, and lost in a strange place. She wandered in through the mists and promptly got lost. She has no idea how lucky she was to escape the mists with her sanity intact. She is unique in this realm - her abilities get revealed over time.

Lord Night - Transmuter/wizard. Can transform himself at will to snow leopard, dragon, and imp - but the latter two are extremely rare.

Rai`Phalon - Knight in Rusted Armor; were-wolf, sort of a bumbling knight - tries hard, but... just... can't... quite.....

Kumari - found as an egg, she turns out to be the missing Dragon Princess, egg stolen by Drakna, who intended to kill the hatchling in a ritual designed to transfer power from the baby.

Takara - approx. 15 years of age, human, asian-like features.... she has an affinity with drawing - her drawings come to life if she draws them accurately. Foundling.

Alice - Approx 10 years of age, human, pale skin, red-head... affinity with healing. Foundling.

Lily - Approx 5 years of age in appearance. Faerie child (unknown for some time). Foundling - affinity with plants and their uses. pale skin, pale green eyes, and very pale blonde hair... found in a patch of lilies (lily of the valley). doesn't speak for a very long time. Later in life, will have to go through a metamorphosis within a cocoon to get her wings.





Drakna - Evil dark dragon who wants to rule all of Dragon-dom and beyond. kidnaps the royal egg and hides it... waiting for it to hatch so she can kill the hatchling and steal the baby princess' power. escalates from there.


Nox - Knight-turned-assassin for hire with a penchant for sucking his thumb when he gets bested.

Assorted other creatures & bit-players.


......

YAY! I've finished rendering the first 3 pages... now to bring them into photoshop and work on the compositing and then the tracing.

after that, I'll go back and do page 4.

oh wait, not quite finished yet... got a few more to do LOL.

gotta re-render my dead knight to use him in a "pile" of "bodies"... and then... find a torch and render that... and lets see... think that MIGHT be.. nope. gotta load all my characters so far and take a nice portrait shot of them... that's for panel 00 LOL.


So basically, so far, I have 4 pages of the first chapter sketched out... well, in idea anyway and some renders that need to be compiled... each chapter - from what I've been seeing - should have about 12-16 pages, with 14 being average. 5 or 6 chapters per book...

I have to say... Paul has been amazing with coming up with story lines. For someone who doesn't usually think outside the box, or SEEM to have a lot of actual creativity... he sure does have a good imagination. I think his problem is that his imaginative ways and creative urges weren't encouraged when he was younger, and now he just isn't sure of himself. Even now, he is shocked whenever I encourage his artistic and creative pursuits.

So, from page 2 to 4... he definately moved the storyline forward. All I had to do was ask basic questions - where are they, why? what are they doing? why? motive? how do they feel? where are they going? - just to help him remember to keep in mind where you want them (characters) to end up.

Page 1 is all me LOL - and i got stuck. So, here is a huge THANK YOU!!! to Paul. The actual finished piece, he will receive proper credit, and I hope he will continue to collaborate on the story-line with me.

I also have to thank another friend of mine, Richard, for helping me come up with the original concept of Thera Lycoris. There's a long story behind this, but I'm not going to share :P. LOL. ... Thank you... from the bottom of my heart =D

But... the original concept for Pensri.... I have to thank, of all people, my daughter. Now, I won't discuss her very often, as she isn't quite 12 years old yet, and I am highly... HIGHLY... protective of her.... but practically from birth, she has been fascinated by felines of all kinds. When she was about 4 or 5, she started talking about how she wanted to be/was a cat-person. She didn't mean someone who thinks cats are the greatest... she meant a blend of feline and human. She talked "cat", she tried to eat like a cat, walk, etc...

She's since settled a lot - although when I got to visit her this past January, I caught her having a meowing conversation with her "daughter" Freja (aka, fraidy-kat). It put a smile on my face, and I just slipped away... You see... I'm will not ever tell my daughter to tone down her imagination. I also want her to grow and mature at a rate that is comfortable for HER - not for the rest of the world. When she is ready for knowledge of certain things, she will seek the answers out.

Anyways... I encourage her imagination every chance I get... I beg her to draw, to color, to do anything that involves that side of her brain. .......

hang on, I have to find a torch to render....


ok, no torch... oil lamp will do.

will find a torch another time. i cant afford to get lost online trying to find a torch.

I am also hoping, on top of my 4 pages, to write up a character sheet, complete with pictures and a small blurb; and even perhaps, if i still have time... a splash sheet for the first chapter... title page for the book.... these are things that won't happen if I happen to run out of time.

Am rendering out character portraits right now... see, i can even reuse these for the character sheet LOL. Gods, I know... cheater.. but hey, when you are a one woman production team... ok, I do have help with the script-writing... but still, essentially, its mostly me.... you find ways to reuse things.

Oh wow... this portrait of Rai Phalon turned out nice. =D

I am SOOOO excited about this project... I've been excited about Thera Lycoris ever since I came up with the idea... but trying to figure out how to USE the ideas I had... a book... but I get bored just WRITING. I am very very VERY much artistic, and I HAVE to express myself through art somehow. The words - they are secondary. So... well, an RPG could be cool, but honestly... I've lost years of my life to IRC and online games - I soooo didn't wanna go there again.

So, Thera has sat on the back burner, while I added bits and pieces of ideas.... and suddenly... with this Final... wow... its coming together. I'll be taking a class in In Design this fall, so I'll definitely be a one-woman production team LOL.

Paul and Richard have heard me rattle on about my ideas for Thera for so long, they both know the whole storyline, so bouncing ideas off them for this is a good thing... and Paul has come up with some excellent stuff!

yeah, i know... i'm rattling on and on, shut UP already.

BLEH. LOL.... I'm manic... have been for a while now... but its a good thing, cus I'm getting stuff done... problem is... i cant seem to shut UP or get STILL. i gotta be doing SOMETHING... i usually get to chat with my friends, but its late for me, so its like way early in morning for them.... thus, they are not online.

So... I blog. I tap my fingers on my desk. I blog more. I wait. I tweak settings in poser. I render. I wait. I blog.

and I wait even more. LOL.

and now... the fun begins on pages 1-3 (4 will come AFTER i finish the minimum requirements. i will not cut myself short because i tried to do too much)... photoshop time!

Catching up...

Catching up real quick, as I've only an hour before I go pick up someone from work.

This week, we've been working on collaborations, so I have nothing to show (bad meli, huh? LOL)...

anyways... this is crunch time. our final is due on tuesday, and scripts/thumbnails are due TOMORROW.

yikes.

and, seems I am the ONLY ONE without a clue STILL on what they want to do. yeesh. leave it to me. problem is, i have TOO MANY ideas, and not a danged one wants to go further than 4 or 5 panels TOTAL.

but then, i tend to do better when under a high-pressure deadline, so hopefully... my brain will KICK IN!!!!!!!!!!

(hello muse... WAKE UP!)

ok... general ideas:

another lost girl episode... first bear encounter.

dragon, knight, and "victim".... several humorous twists on this one theme....

gardener's plot idea - daisy gets budnapped, and is wired into a fancy arrangement, and sunny has to rescue her...

the first two, i could easily set up on computer... it would basically be one stage setting, possibly two, for each idea...

i've a feeling the dragon one is going to win, as i just cannot get the ideas out of my head.... and i keep coming back to it...

Kumari the Dragon Princess....

Takara, the victim

and Rai`Phalon as the Knight in Dented Armor...

hmmm....

Homework, Week 4 - 3+-panel Strips

I also turned in a printed version of Lost Girl 001 (her leaving Virginia to come to Alaska) so my total of turned in pieces was 5 (instead of 4) - there were almost 6, but the fish strip refused to cooperate.

here it is again, 'cus the moose makes me giggle!


the one that is penciled here got inked right before class; I will have to wait to scan in the finished one ;)


(Lost Girl, episode 002) --- pretty self-explanatory.






(LG - Random 002) (here, i took one of the 6-word "stories" in one of our handouts and had fun with it. There's a few of these in here like that.)

(LG - Random 003) -- ok, i did have one person ask me what I was trying to do here (another reason I did extra for the assignment, I'm not particularly fond of this one, either) - basically, she cooked... she set table... she called for dinner and before she could finish calling her family to the table it seems dinner has been eaten and the people scattered, leaving her with the mess.



Last one:

No Name 001. I couldn't make this into a Lost Girl episode, as it doesn't fit her story-line. I was inspired by another of those 6-word stories, this one by, I do believe, Earnest Hemingway. Simple... effective... devastating.

The Lie

Sometimes, I create art (or comics, or whatever) as a sort of personal therapy to work through some of the more intense negative emotions and situations I end up in. I have numerous "darker" pieces that punctuate my "Fine" Artwork like staccato beats in an orchestra playing Brahms lullaby. Ok... not quite like that, but I loved the mental image that particular sentance gave, so had to keep it ;)

Actually, I rarely show my darker pieces to more than a few people. I do have one up at renderosity.com - (user name: melikia) - but you have to sign up & sign in to see it, as I have all sorts of tags & warnings on it - its one that seriously shocks when you first view it. I even had to add in a disclaimer that I was safe, physically & etc due to the setup for potential violence in the image itself. Its also the only image I have ever gotten a warning on from the staff there - not the image itself which was not in violation of the ToS, but for my thumbnail. Thankfully, I was allowed to present my reasons for creating my thumbnail the way I did and not abiding by their own rules for introducing the idea of mature content in the thumbnail.... as my reasons made perfect sense (their own thumbnail we are SUPPOSED to use, i felt was too generic and bland, and the image needed more of a warning - a LOT more). I won, and my thumbnail still stands.




Now, the back-story for this particular piece.

I was lied to for 6 months... my mate spent SIX MONTHS sneaking cigs behind my back and telling me lies to my face. Even when he went to confess, he STILL lied for over an hour saying it had only been a few days, until I managed to get everything out of him.

When we first started dating, I told him that the one thing that kills a relationship faster than anything else is dishonesty, and as long as he was honest with me - anything else could be worked through.

Without honesty... without truth.... there can be no trust.

We are carefully rebuilding our relationship - and he has, so far, abided by my ultimatum. Either he kisses a cigarette, or he kisses me. In other words - choose. There's no room for both in his life, not when one of them represents a 6-month-long lie.

Im doing what I can to support him in this. He chose to be with me... I can choose to set aside my pain long enough to help him with something that IS extremely difficult. I'm still crying way too easily (going through the grief cycle)... and haven't been my usual bubbly self. A fact I'm sure my fellow students noticed, but thankfully didn't comment on.... I couldnt even tell the whole truth to the instructor... I simply said I had only had 4 hours sleep (truth), and my chronic fatigue/fibro (I tend to use those terms interchangeably - anyone who has them should understand that - heck, even my docs do LOL) was acting up (truth, but not to the degree it could be with all the stress I'm under).

As I said... things are getting better...

I'll post what I turned in for homework this past week here in a bit, I have to take care of the raw scans first, and then... turn my attention to a script for a 1 page (6 to 9 panel) comic that is to be a collaboration.

fun fun. =D

(credits for image: Poser 7 for setup, Aiko 3, Hiro 3, Daz: A3 ponytail, Wedgecut 2, Kioku pants & shoes (aiko), sacred luna top (aiko). Adzan - love outfit for Hiro. Photoshop, and my wacom tablet (traced the original image LOL))

(Miss) Adventures of Lost Girl; Random 001, 002

Occasionally, I will deviate from the story line I am currently working on, and introduce a "Random Moment". Ok, it might happen a lot more.

Meanwhile, here are two such Random Moments. There should be at least one more... I'm working on another one, but I'm having difficulty with parts of it.

Again, forgive my mediocre drawing skills (notice i upgraded myself from crappy to mediocre??) LOL.


Ok... Random Moment # 001:

Please note, these are sketches, and may change... the X's in the background of some areas indicate where I intend on solid black to be put (aka spot black).



Can't say much about this one... if you look too close at the humor, it bursts like a soap bubble in a room full of crystal points. I also love to throw my "favorite" coffee shop - The Fix - in there... BTW - as far as I know, "The Fix" as a coffee place/kiosk is available - please feel free to use it (it rocks!), just let me know (and send a pic!!!) so I can grin.

look close at the newspaper.... i'll add actual "articles" - such as Local Cartoonist and Beaver Battle; Ends In Draw. - well, whatever will fit. ;)


Random Moment # 002:


What can I say about this one? LOL. The middle panel will have the black background with white lettering - all the "negative" things in life. The "bursts" will remain white and have black lettering - all the "positives" in life.... sort of Lost Girl's memoirs.

I also like the open panel thing, and it can really mark a contrast with the more formal straight edges, and I seem to be growing fond of poking items out of frame edges & borders.

Anyways, gonna spend this afternoon "inking" on the computer, but will likely ink these by hand for the actual assignment.

(edit: first one!)

(Miss) Adventures of Lost Girl (001) - INKED

Inking done on computer in photoshop with a wacom.

Daisy has been Found!!!!

Ok, honestly, had no clue the poor darling was lost, but wow... I went to the transfer site today and she was THERE. sitting right beside a dumpster - not only that, but she was in ehr ORIGINAL BOX with the ORIGINAL TAPE sealing her up.

She's HILARIOUS! unfortunately, she has to be RIGHT beside the radio or she won't dance. think a bit of tinkering by my dad could fix that - either that, or pass her over to Paul's father's girlfriend (she's an electrician) to see how to improve the movement and perhaps sensitivity.

I intend on adding some cloth "petals" to her head as well as leaf "mittens" for her hands and feet.

It was funny... cus soon as I grabbed it and headed to the car, Paul saw it and went "YOU FOUND DAISY!" (which prompted laughter from at least two other people - who cares... there's a joke somewhere here about one man's trash being some cartoonist's treasure....)

Seriously - look at her!
THAT'S DAISY! LOL.

BTW - her favorite radio station so far seems to be Wolf 98 LOL.

IM SO EXCITED! she's soooo CUTE!