Dragon Age 2 stuff

Because the game is already out and I can't even properly indulge in it because my darn final year project keeps mocking me at every given moment. So I end up stalking mods on DA Nexus, or the Fenris thread on BSN forums. Bah.

If only the in-game mage armors were like this... Sadly, this is just me being delusional. Hoods are a must because they're cool! Nothing screams bad-ass mage better than a cool hood. And I recycled my designs again, whatever. Maybe there'll be cool hair mods in the future so I can customize my character to look like this, lol. One can only hope. 

Fenrissssss~~ <333 

My PC, Eiloweyn Hawke; mage. Mages are awesome!
Leave me to my delusions, thanks.

Hawke & Fenris 8DDD
Secretly pining for each other. *troll face*
I'd like to think this was set some years after that night. Gotta love unresolved issues. Angst, delicious angst.

Sketch

Hmm... don't I always draw Hirari with this sort of disenchanted look on her face?
It's probably my subconscious retaliation to all those years of drawing genki/moe-faced OCs.
No idea what clothes to draw them in, so I left scribbles instead. Haha.

More Gundam 00 OC

...and still no final design yet. Ah, whatever, at this point I'm just going to fool around with it. Moreover, the 00 movie ending sort of realized my worst fears... so I'm kinda meh with this series right now. But drawing OCs is always fun even when it's completely pointless so I'm still doodling her sometimes.

Far right pic was drawn at the back of my Japanese Language & Culture test paper, heh.

  

Oldies collection~ (2006 & 2007)

Cleaned my room and found some old drawings of mine. It was fun looking at them but now that I'm posting them here, I feel terribly self-conscious. ^^;

2006 

Random OC - I wanted to draw a Japanese-style 'prince' type character xD; 

Hirari (was playing around with the calligraphy brush pen)

Saiseki Hirari

Hirari & Rikyou

Hirari & Hiioryuu... unfinished. 

Older Mineko from Helios Eclipse (a local comic series)

Hiioryuu in knitwear... rofl

Rikyou outfit design for artwork 'Maiden'

Adairel outfit design sketch (for 'Our Journey Begins Here' artwork on dA)

Valia Leiros (Cleyf's character) outfit design. This was the initial sketch.

Design for Hirari's RPG-ish outfit (the one in 'Dance').
I really like the hoodie but didn't actually draw her
wearing it like that in the final artwork.

2007

Rikyou in modern clothes. Lol.

Rikyou

This one's a lucky find: group pic zomg!! 8DD
This was drawn on lined paper; I was lazy to properly clean up all the lines on Photoshop. Bah.
Clockwise top: Hiio, Adairel, Some Dude, Naoya, Rikyou, Hirari

I'd been cleaning up my old OC pics I've never shown anyone before in hopes of making a 'timeline' or something (mainly to amuse myself) but since I kept procrastinating, it's going nowhere fast. And I'm also absolutely stumped as to how I'm actually gonna sort them all out. 

  

Sketch dump 2009-2010 (sounds grand. It's NOT. Haha.)

Well, most that I can find, anyways (and ones I don't feel too embarrassed showing lol).

Sketch dump year
2009-2010
(sounds grand but there
isn't much, really)

1.

Random doodles. Don't you feel like those hands don't appear to connect to their bodies? xD;

2-4. 

Designs for Gundam 00 OC. Still trying to figure her out, yeah. But I'm a bit distracted by something else right now so I don't know when I'll be able to get back to her. 

5.    

Hirari; from a random scene. 

6.    

Hirari with glasses. Was gonna submit to Patch Together but didn't. 

7.    

Another random scene. Hiioryuu fusses over a mysterious bruise on Hirari's face. xD 

(Hiioryuu: Let me see... Hirari: It's nothing! Really! Hiioryuu: Hold still! Hirari: NO! urgh...)

8.   

A collection of random doodles done while tuning-out lectures. I think I was in a bad mood, hence the finger. 

9.   

Old sketches - a random character and 2 of Rikyou. 

10. 

Singing girl. Was listening to Vocaloid covers by Nico2 singers.

11.

Mikana (old design) and Hirari. I like drawing Mika. She's tall and pretty and has a mature body. (- wut?). She's very different from Hirari, maybe that's what makes it fun. 

12. 

Hirari and Hiioryuu. The bond between two... (The pic makes me think of 'master & slave' haha)

13. 

Some doodles of Rikyou, Hiioryuu and Hirari... and a random cropped face. 

14. 

Age x Deianeira, my favourite OTP!!! <3 Heroic Age is one of my beloved anime of all time. OF ALL TIME!

15. 

A scene from a drabble of mine where Hirari enters Hiioryuu's subconscious and makes a bargain with his 'other', darker version of himself so she could save his life. Hiioryuu with long hair!

16. 

ROFL please don't misunderstand, I didn't mean to draw Hirari so 'loli'-looking here. xD;; 

17. 

Dancing salsa...? Or something. Lol~

*raises hand in defeat*

Was supposed to be working on something else but I got distracted with this which is kinda like a 'test' for the other drawing, although this one was inked digitally (oh my god I don't even-) and I gave up when attempting to do the mech arm (which is notably absent in this pic since it is very horrible). I ended up spending so much time on this when, really, it's still just line art. *facepalm* Yes, do laugh mockingly at my exploits because it is rather hilarious in a sad way.

I feel really annoyed with this right now so I'm just gonna stop. Hopefully I'll be able to get back my vigor tomorrow and continue. The smart thing is to just draw the mech arm with good old mechanical pencil instead and scan that. Digital art makes me feel like a retard... more often than not. =_=

My burning interest in Transformers (movie-verse) got me feeling like drawing again. Not that I never liked it before, but I dunno, I guess you can say it's the 'IN' thing for me at the moment (previously it was Gundam 00, remember?). Yep, that's me - dashing from one temporary thrill to another.    


The idea was to draw her reaching out and touching a giant mech's hand. Well, whatever. >__> 

Disney

No thanks to the new sneek peeks on Tangled, I now can't get it out of my head. Looking forward to the new Alan Menken songs (gosh, I hope they're good and they'll revert back to the 'old-school' type of Disney Princess songs. I wasn't fond of the Princess and the Frog jazzy numbers). I NEED NEW DISNEY SONGS!!! Gaaah!


I really should stop this feeling of anticipation... it will only make the waiting unbearable. 

Hirari, Disney-style. Well, I tried. 

I would upload that half-assed Rapunzel fanart I did during my internship in Animonsta (more relevant to this entry) but unfortunately I can't open the file cuz my SAI expired. ^^;

"We're all alone."

I finally cleaned up this old thing (it's probably over a year old, maybe more, so excuse the huge head, etc etc).

It's OC, Saiseki Hirari. A very typical composition I suppose, but I've always wanted to do something like this. And it's almost 5 am. I should sleep now.

Doodle 03 - Update. Oh shi-

On how that OC is coming along... I'm still stuck. 

I did some background research on the Gundam 00 universe (prequels, side-stories, etc)... and found out there already are similar-looking styles on other existing characters like the ones I came up with. Oh shi- Σ(ﾟДﾟ；) The characters aren't within the main cast and don't appear in the actual anime, so I never noticed similarities until now when I've actually gone and poured over the Gundam wiki. 

There are 2 ways to look at this. On one hand, it appears that my ideas are 'mainstream'...? On the other, it seems like they're completely banal and predictable. -__-

... Back to the drawing board? 

*sigh* The things I do for the sake of personal enjoyment...... >__> Normal people would simply switch on the TV or go on a date or something.  

Doodle 03 - Gundam 00 oc

So....

I started watching Gundam 00. Yes. Finally. I have not finished watching it yet but it gave me the urge to make an original character for that series... haha. xD;;; 

Why? Because I like Setsuna. I think his name is really catchy - Setsuna F. Seiei. xD And there's a severe lack of decent female characters to pair him up with (and as you already know, I like my anime intakes with pairings on the side). 

That one potentially canon option in the form of Marina Ismail is, well... unacceptable. That woman... oh, don't let me get started. Feldt Grace, I kind of like... but that ship barely floats as it is. Too bad. Anyway, at this rate I prefer Setsuna to stay gay over his Exia rather than pursue any of these girls (and god forbid certainly not Marina!).  

Back to the point - I doodled some hairstyles but none of them really felt right to me. So I'm still... working on it. I have a potential first name for her though, which is progress at least. Might even start a drabble on this... if I can maintain my interest.

I'm sorry to assault your eyes with my wonky-faced mary-sues. 

The short, straight hair is a bit too... serious-looking, IMO? The one with the hairband thingie reminds me of Ranka >__>; The wavy ones, on the other hand, look pretty typical... I always end up drawing curls. And the first one, which I liked, looks so similar to Hirari's hair. Lol~ Frustration. 

Doodle 02

Look what I did during accounting class! Lol~

Some random melodramatic scene. Doesn't really have 

a storyline behind it, so don't think too much about it.

Yeah, it's Hirari and Hiioryuu. xD;

---

Soon I will be by my beloved

Who really was here,

With face enveloped

in two cold hands.

The long journey came to an end so,

In the middle of quiet tranquility,

I grieved alone

And cried just a little.

~ Gloria (Kalafina)

Doodle 01

Some dated stuff in my new sketch book. 
Ignore the funky anatomy. xD; 

Of spells and crimson

"There'll be ash and dust to bury us but I will keep you clean."
- Dashboard Confessionals "Alter the Ending"

Cahaelynn Amell

My human mage slash Grey Warden character in Dragon Age: Origins - Cahaelynn. I honestly tried, but she still ended up looking so Asian.

DA:O is an awesome game by the way, though I had to get pass my initial prejudice towards Western RPGs and their horrid, horrid character design. Really, under normal circumstances I wouldn't even give the game a single glance having been absolutely spoiled by pretty boys  of the Square Enix variety. The charm of the game lies in the writing and characters. The dialogues are abundant and entertaining. Also, the fact that some characters are romance-able is a strong point of appeal for the 'otome' gamer in me (even if there's only one whom I'm actually interested in... Alistair!! <33). Being a mage is so much more fun than the other classes (though I'm being totally biased and not speaking from experience of playing other origins here... XP) We get better wardrobes (or at least mod wardrobes) and get to fling awesome spells from a relatively safe distance. Alas, the mage ending is just..... *depressed stance*. I hate it when game outcomes get too realistic on me. Bleh.  

I saw a few tutorial vids on digital colouring on Youtube. They make it look so easy. Lies. All lies. =__= The original drawing was bigger than this. After much frustration, and wrestling with SAI and Photoshop, I realized I needed to start on a smaller scale so I cropped it to this size. My mind just couldn't process it before because there was just so many things to consider. It felt a lot smoother working on a smaller canvas. I need to learn to set reachable goals. >__>; I'm trying to comprehend the grayscale shading technique the uber pros use in which they shade the characters in monochrome and add soft touches of colours on top of that layer. It seems to work remarkably well (for them). Appears simple enough too but... ah, I should have known.  


I still think markering is far simpler than this by a long shot. But there are things that markers aren't able to emulate no matter how skilled one is. I think there are certain... looks that can only be achieved by a single, distinct medium. 

 

So I'm straight in a straight line, running back to you

Hirari & Hiioryuu - Aa, the effects... -_-;

Without the effects. 

Omake

One day, I was bored. Wanted to draw but found the thought of dirtying my hands an annoyance. I toyed briefly with tegaki but it was lagging at the time so I opened Photoshop instead and started doodling. It went fine until PS decided to crash on me for absolutely no reason (I think it's more my PC's fault rather than the program's). Didn't even get the chance to save my work - was too preoccupied that I forgot. Fueled by a rebellious attitude, I started once more from square one while listening to various cover versions of Just Be Friends (originally by Vocaloid Megurine Luka).  

Many many mistakes in the pic. Hirari looks weird. Lol~ And I didn't colour-in the black part of Hiioryuu's hair. Maybe I'll rectify that on the 2nd round of touch-ups.  I'd probably go back to fix some off parts later. EDITED.

The PV of Just Be Friends may have influenced the outcome of the drawing in some ways. I think this song has one of the best Vocaloid PVs I'd ever seen. The simplicity and clean artwork was enormously appealing to me. Below are several covers that I like. I prefer to listen to real people singing Vocaloid songs xD.

うさ x ぷろれ (2nd fav version) | セリユ ft. けったろ (My fav version) | らっぷびと (Rap ver.) | Yamai (piano ver.) | 櫻井 piano ver. (her voice is good different. Just ignore the heavy 'Engrish' accent at the start xD;)

The ghost of days we can’t return to...

Hiioryuu and Rikyou

I'm so tired of this, yet part of me wants to see it done too (I want to colour Hiioryuu's hair *sigh*). It's a really old line art that I got stuck on for ages.  Just look at the nearly torn sketchbook. That's proof enough, lol. Have no clue what to put at the background there.

Rikyou looks like a rehash of Maiden. =_= On the other hand, I like drawing Hiioryuu with long hair. This is from way back when - before he met Hirari. I accidentally drew him overly 'manly' here. Oh no.  And I hate the bottom part of his outfit... I probably will have to re-think it again.

Don't know when I'm ever going to finish this.

The silence within the headphone...

Saiseki Hirari

静寂はヘッドフォンの中 by See-Saw is among my favourite Japanese songs and also one of the image songs for my (non-existent) story Hanne Monogatari. This was done July this year (also while I was in Les Copaque). I accidentally overwrote the original size file. *bangs head on desk* I didn't put much effort in cleaning this up - you can see how uneven my markering is thanks to the scanner enhancing every tiny bit of flaw. 

I was surprised I drew her toes quite well here. I suck at that usually.

I like drawing emo poses.

Translated the song myself since no translations were found at the time this entry was written. Naturally, there are probably lots of errors. I tried my best. 

---

Gradually fading from being something of importance

“It is only natural.”

So, I was told

The silence wraps around my lone headphone

As I search for your voice.

Your honest remarks, thrown straight at me

"It happens all the time."

I got through them with that single word

“Please split whatever burden you’re carrying in half.”

Why was it that I couldn't seem to say it? 

Back then, my feet were always getting soiled

in order for me to stand my ground 

It was perhaps still far too early to speak of kindness

The more we lay bare our feelings 

the closer we might come to find tranquility 

Is it that we shatter a beautiful scenery 

out of fear for something?

I don’t understand it myself

Why are you here?

I'd give you the st★rs if I could...

Saiseki Hirari - B★RS mode

What I did while waiting for Adobe After Effects to finish rendering during my short stint with Les Copaque. 

Don't think overly much about this, I was just fooling around. I call it Hirari's B★RS mode (ala the infamous Black★Rock Shooter of Hatsune Miku fame) because of the star hair-clip, basically. *shrug* And the whole... rugged, ready-to-kick-ass look.

Turn away, I don't want you to see me broken...

Hiioryuu & Hirari

Old sketch which was left to collect dust upon realizing that inking digitally only serves to multiply the workload instead of lessening it. So I got bored halfway.

There's a tear on the side of her cheek... you probably can't see.

Here's to my favourite emo couple. xD

The raging golden tempest...

Digging through my stuff in my HDD, I found this old doodle of my Gensoumaden Saiyuki original character - Chiho Mikana or 'Mika' for short. I'm very fond of her though I rarely draw her anymore nowadays. She's probably my only OC with really long hair (before Rikyou came along). Don't know why I like her so much; I just do. She's fun to draw and colour (more so than Hirari, believe it or not). I've cleaned this up a bit but you'll definitely still notice the outdated style.





This is the latest drawing of her to date (either 2008 or 09, not sure). I made changes to the design in this one. I still have the initial drawings of her at my dA account if you're curious to see how she looked like back then. Her theme colours are gold/red/brown and the tattered scarf and long skirt is sort of her trademark look. xD Since I created her as a match for Son Goku (who I absolutely adore), I purposely made certain things in her designs similar to his. She wears a power limiter (akin to Goku's forehead circlet) around her left upper arm though she keeps it covered with bandages or a glove most of the time. Her weapon is a long staff with narrow, sword-like blades at each end. I think it has a name, but that escapes me at the moment. She's a heretic & a half-breed (specifically, a mixture of demonic and goddess blood) and bears a mark on her forehead to indicate this. The 'Gaiden' version of herself is named Kiome, and died after performing an uber noble deed of self-sacrifice to save the world. Lol xD. Oh, and she also has a berserk mode where she transforms into a black-haired, sharp clawed, bloodlust killer.