So…I don’t post in forever other than a couple of whiny journals, and when I do, it’s some Halo nonsense?! What the heck?!
Well, don’t worry, I haven’t suddenly become a Halo fan, in fact, I don’t really know anything about the games (not that there’s anything wrong with them, I just a-don’t own an Xbox and b-suck at FPS’s so I’d never buy it). These fanarts are from the webseries Red Vs. Blue, a machinema series based on Halo.
I’m starting to realize that half the reason I do fanart is to give me an excuse to babble about the things I love, what a nerd.
Anyway, the series is pretty random, and crass, but you can’t help but love the characters, even though they’re all horrible jerks. It’s pretty long at this point, but I still recommend. Especially when you start to get to the later stuff, there’s a shift to a more serious tone and that’s when I really started to love it!

Anyway, it’s machinema, which means the animation is limited to what the game engine can do, so you never see the characters without their helmets and you identify them by color. A guy named Luke McKay went through and designed his interpretations of what they looked like without their helmets.
I loved his designs, and wanted to try them, and I also wanted to give drawing the armor a try. So I did it and it was fun, but don’t worry, my gallery’s probably not going to be flooded with this stuff. Now that I got it out of my system, you probably won’t see it pop up again. But it was fun, and that’s what matters.

So...I like to make AMV's. It's sort of a guilty pleasure, but not much of a secret, I like animation and I like music. Put them together and YAY! I recognize that there's a lot of levels on which they don't qualify as "art" being that I make neither the animation, nor the music. They're just fun!

So I actually don't mind much when people post my AMV's on youtube, being that they are just a fun fan thing and I don't have a youtube account anyway. These, for example, [link] [link] (sound's been removed on the second one). This doesn't bother me at all, because one credits me directly, and another at least admits that they did not create it themselves. That's good enough.

But THIS one posted my video, and I take issue with it: [link]
You might remember it from here: [link]
At first you could look at it as if they just haven't credited anyone, not that they're taking credit for it. Though it seems odd that they feel the need for a "fan-made" disclaimer, when it isn't even their work. But a friend of mine took it upon himself to comment, asking that proper credit be given, s/he deleted his comment. Which makes me kind of angry.
How hard is it to add a note saying "this isn't mine"? Granted, it's just an AMV, but I sank a LOT of hours into editing that thing. It took weeks! They aren't easy! I'd like people to at least acknowledge it!

My friend also did a little sleuthing and discovered that the other AMV they have posted is ALSO not theirs, despite the fact that they complain about the trouble they had editing it in the description. Yeah, I really feel for all the hardships you went through...jackass.

Now I'm trying to decide if I want to post this to art_theft on lj, or actually get a youtube account to post my videos (I really don't want too, it seems like more trouble than it's worth...).
Meh...I can't fathom why people do this, though. How can it feel good to get compliments for something that's not yours? My art may not be the best, but at least it's mine!

First off, sorry I didn't get a pirate post up for Talk-Like-a-Pirate day this year. I had some stuff planned, but wasn't able to get it done in time. So sad. But it should be done soonish.

But I did go to the local Rennaissance Festival this year, and that was pretty fun. We watched the jousts and saw a 20 minute Shakespeare play. We saw a humorous weapon's display and browsed the shops.
There was one funny thing I wanted to talk about though. We went into an artist's gallery and while looking over his paintings and drawings, one picture struck me. I pointed to it and asked my sister, "does that look familiar to you?"
She looked and said "Yes, but I like yours better."
What it essentaily was, was this: [link]
Now, I don't in any way think the guy plagiariazed me (Despite what I may have inadvertently said out loud at the time ) because in the first place, why? In the second place, how would he have found it? And in the third place, it's really not that unique a concept. But it was still striking, take my image, make it in a sepia-toned rennaissance-style pencil, and turn it to a 3/4 view instead of head on and there you have it! (I wish I could show you guys, I found his gallery online, but he only posts his paintings, not his pencil work -_-)

...but even though his was technically a better piece by a long shot, I do think mine is more successful at the end of the day. Why? Because his is titled "defeated" which seems pretty cut-and-dry. In mine, the idea behind it is that he's at his lowest point, but has everything he needs to rise out of it. His wings are ragged, but still whole. That's the whole point. It's about hope, not despair. If I were going to do a picture like that titled "defeated", his wings would be shredded. Do you see what I mean? Now of course you can make up a whole scenario surrounding "defeated" but when you look at it with that title, you see only defeat. Mine invites you to think further, and so I am pleased with myself.

---

Unrelated, I went through my watch list today and removed a bunch of people, mostly artists whose work is really beautiful, but I have no real connection to, and so it felt kinda shallow. (To me, because I knew neither the person nor their subject, that's not to say they were shallow pieces because they defenitely were not!) But it was triggered by one in particular who has AMAZING art! ...but keeps posting these really ranty, paranoid, conspiracy-theory laced journals. Stuff like how the government is tracking us through the fluoride in your water...seriously? You think the government has nothing better to do than see what you're up to at 2 a.m.? I hate to break it to you, but your life is not that interesting.
Sorry, but good art or no, you're creepy, dude.
I also culled out old school friends who never post, and old webcomic buddies I haven't talked to in years.

It's nice, though, so I can slim down my watch list to things I actually want to see.

AND SPEAKING OF THAT!
I'm behind on checking deviations again. It seems like I have less and less available time as time goes on, but I'll go through and catch up on all of them again sometime this week.

Thanks for bearing with me, those of you that have! You shall hear from me again soon!

All right, all otakon stuff is taken care of now. It was a fun convention, though we didn't do much but hang out with friends. That was more than good enough.

I took three costumes this year, you can see them at my livejournal: [link]

I don't have too much to say about it beyond that, but I do want to share one fun thing with you guys. Remember that picture of Chopper I did? [link]
Well, I printed it out in full poster size, but it didn't come out so well. The lines and the coloring looked great, but the colors were just plain bad. If you look at the original picture on here, it has an orange/brown feel to it. What I got from the printer was yellow. Like, if you took my picture, greyed it out, then put a yellow tint overtop. I was VERY disappointed with it.

To be fair, I don't blame the printers. I've worked with printers long enough to know that printers and monitors handle color very differently, and what you see isn't always what you get. I should have done a smaller test-print beforehand. It's really not their fault, but knowing that didn't make the picture look any better.

But I decided to put it into the art show anyway, since I had paid all the money to have it printed. I put it's starting bid at about a third of the cost of printing it, just hoping to get it sold.

The first time I checked on it, someone had bid on it at the starting price, which I was thrilled by, because that meant that it at least sold.
When I went back after the auction ended to check on how much it ended up going for, the price had tripled. This made my day, because not only did it actually sell, but more than one person had bid on it! And it payed for the cost of printing it! Imagine if it had actually been a good print!

So, it's a kind of lame story, but I had to share, because I went into it with no expectations. Pretty good result for how disappointed I was beforehand!

Also, I'm selling printed copies of the first six chapters of Twisted Mirrors. I only have ten copies total, but if you'd like one, check out this post: [link]
Anonymous commenting is ON, so you don't need an lj to ask for one. I just wanted to keep all the requests in one place and that seemed easiest.

So...I'm behind on DA again...

Sorry I'm so slow everyone. I will catch up, I promise, but what's really got me bummed is my own lack of creating stuff. I love doing the comics and I work on them diligently every week, but I wish I had the free time to just relax and kick back and get some original art (or hell, even fan art, I'm not picky!) done.

The secret project took up a lot of time, which some of you know about and some don't (since I only revealed it to friends on lj), I'm still not sure how I want to handle that from here, but this isn't intended to be a "pique you interest" type line, it's more to say, "I've been working! Just on nothing visible to youse guys."

With Otakon coming up in a few weeks, though, I'll probably continue to be fairly busy. There may be a few fanart posts, but until I get through that, I doubt there will be much else.

Anyway, I'm still here, still doing stuff, and I WILL get to check all my messages and catch up on all your awesome stuff! Just. You. Wait!