Screw it, it's Friday!

Finally the month of May is over. OMfrigginG what a month. There were so many deadlines running one after another that at one point I literally lost track of days, almost going into a panic attack on sending stuff out to clients. But it's all done, and thank goodness for that. That's not to say we're out of the woods yet, in fact, not by a long shot. We still have cons to prep for this summer, a couple of big ones to boot, and commission work that still needs finishing. Today though I was bad...I took a few hours off and worked on something silly just because I wanted to. So I came up with this

Our reaction after buying new art supplies lol!

It's SO silly and meme'd to hell but I couldn't help it, it was just too funny to me, lol! And with that out of my system, I think I'm ready to tackle actual work artwork, lol!

Miriam

Sunday sketchy Sunday

Woke up feeling cruddy; too awake to sleep but too tired to be productive. So, instead of staying lazy I spent the morning sketching on PS to warm myself up to get commissions done. Decided to venture into some unfamiliar brushes (the ones that actually looked like brushes on the left side of the screen when I clicked on them) and I really liked some of the results!

some fuzzy charcoal brushes with varying roughness. It took forever to get a mark!

Wetter, smudgier. Much easier to mark. Square charcoal pencil. I think, LOL!

Wanted to draw another dude since that last one was fugly. More of the charcoal pencil, with another charcoal texture.

What's a sketch without the typical eye sketch? LOL! I was playing strictly with the pencils. I love love love the layering effects with them!! The pit oil pencil I think is one of my favorites. Love the texture it gives!

Softer pencil, but still had a real light touch to it. After a few minutes, I liked where it was going, so I decided to flesh it out some more.

Still using the pencils just varying the size and angle of the brush, using color this time. It ended up very fashion sketchy!

All in all I'm very happy with the experiments and I'm looking forward to playing with these new brushes some more! Maybe even save some with custom presets; I keep forgetting how to save altered brush settings, then I forget which brush I was using that I really liked and what I did to it. I spend half my time trying to find it, and when I do I forget to save again! It's a vicious cycle LOL

Miriam

Show and tell

I've come to the realization that I don't put up nearly as much art as I should. Sometimes I get self conscious, or get all like, "it's gotta be finished and pretty before anyone can see!"

Sometimes though, it takes forever to get something "finished and pretty" and then nothing gets put up because of it. But while I'm waiting for that perfect finished piece, I sketch. A whole, whole lot; and I kinda think there's alot of character in something that's still being roughed out and in that respect, might still worth showing.

I love seeing sketches and progress work, yet I rarely post any of my own; which is weird considering alot of my friends love the sketchy stuff too, lol! So here's me, braving the embarrassment and showing off some sketches:

Sketch I did from MCO to JFK. My goal was to do a drawing from start to finish within the time of the flight.

Same goal, from JFK to MCO. Not quite as gestural as I'd wanted but it was still fun!

Jenny and Wind spoiled me rotten with art supplies from Kinokuniya! One of the awesome new toys were these calligraphy brush pens. The page is a whole lotta warm up and then a quickie sketch with them. OMG so much fun!

This is what I do when I'm bored out of my mind at work. I paint. The sketch took me about an hour to do, the painting took another hour and a half. Didn't get to the teeth and tongue on time. GRRR!

Inspired from a Linkin Park song Castle of Glass. I'm totally loving my anatomy fail with her wrist. It's so broken, LOL!

Throwing around some ideas for some paintings. Merida, Rapunzel (although it doesn't really look like her, lol!) and Pocahontas. The other two on the bottom are some spray paint concepts that I cannot wait to try!

Another spray paint concept. I'm really hoping they come out well!

Miriam =)

What to wear, what to wear!

I don't think I've ever had this much fun drawing clothes since high school. I also haven't done this much research into styles and trends stuff in like...ever! Ami has much more possibilities dress wise than Mochi, and it was very hard not to make an entire wardrobe for her, lol! But I managed to whittle the 9 or so outfits down to 3 and from those made different color sets for them. Which do you think look the best?

Breathing new life into an old project

Sometimes I hate looking at old work. I'm beginning to think there are reasons why certain artists don't like to revisit it. One tweak leads to another and another, and before you even realize it you've changed almost everything about it.

Well, that's kind of where I'm at currently.

I came across a project that I had really wanted to do while at school, but ended up having to pitch it because I wouldn't finish it on time. At least, not at the level I wanted (senior year and all that). Initially I thought that since I had all my preliminaries done I could just jump right in and start running some tests, but after not seeing for almost 2 years, I noticed lots of things that could (or needed) to be altered.

So I'm revisiting every aspect about this project. Because of this, I need your guys' help.

I need some serious critiquing on several aspects of this project. Are these characters convincing? Does their appearance resemble the personality I'm trying to achieve based on the description? I don't expect many really to know where the origins of the story came from, but I would like to have some thing to tie in to their corresponding gods besides their personalities, so I'm playing with color as well. Any kind of observations you can provide me would be awesome. I think this has a lot of potential to be something really fantastic and I want to have the best finished product achievable. But I won't draw a single frame until everything about this, the story, the characters, all the stuff that may never see the light of day, is convincing and as great as it can be.

The story itself is set to be a high school drama loosely based on a Japanese creation myth.
here's a shortened version of the original and here's a prettier, longer version. Unfortunately, neither of these match the original story I got it from (all my books about it are in storage) but these are a close fit, at least to get the gist of the story about.

So I guess I should bring out some of these sketches right?

This is Ukemochi:

In most of these, she's seen with glasses, but that's because her original character design has her with
them.

First attempt at face and body shapes to make sure all of them look different.

Initial gestures, trying to get a feel for her outward character.

Here though, she's shown without them, to see her expressions clearly and to kind of see what she looks like without them in the first place, lol!

concepts for her school outfit. More muted earthy tones (save for one or two on there)

This girl is an amazing chef. That's where she really shines, what she's totally passionate about. She loves how it brings people together. To try new things, for comfort, to relax and let their guard down and have a great meal. For her, food is the best weapon for bad days, first impressions, thank-you's, awkward silences...pretty much everything.

Thing is no one really knows about it. She's super shy, hides behind her hair and her glasses (although I'm quite torn with them; she looks nice with or w/o them) doesn't say much if anything at all to anyone. Most people don't like her, but we're really not quite sure why. It's one of those clique things I guess; she's not made of money, not fru-fru about everything in life, not superficial or vain like many in the school can be. There is however, one person that she confides in and opens up to.

That person is Amaterasu:

Hair ideas. Trying for something simple, but still fashionable. Is that even possible? LOL!

Concepts for her school outfit. Not sure which one I like the best.

In the who's who of rank and status, she's the first on everyone's list. She's very much involved with different student activities and events, often taking the lead of many at once. A stickler for academia, her record's damn near stellar, the epitome of a model student. Add to that her ridiculous wealth and connections through her father and you've got one hell of an elite, making her admired and sought after from anyone and everyone on and off school grounds.

Despite all the fawning though, she's never been one to flaunt her status in anyone's face. In fact, she's super humble about it. She friendly with everyone she's come across, always willing to help however she can. She is quite reserved though. While she downplays her position, she's not blind to the reality of it, or that many don't want to befriend her so much as wanting to use her status to help their own.

There's also the issue of keeping appearances, making sure no one is aware of her own burdens, like her crumbling family, her father that's never around, leaving her to raise her brothers Susano-wo and Tsukuyomi (for this story though, it's only the latter) that are bloated with entitlement. Because of this, she keeps many of her peers at arms length. The only person she's ever been able to let her guard down with, completely and totally has been Ukemochi. This bothers Tsukuyomi immensely.


This is what I've got so far. Once I've got a decision on the hairstyle I can work on an expression sheet for her. I'm working on Tsukuyomi as we speak and can't wait to get him done up. I think he's gonna be my most challenging. I can't wait!

To all that have already put in your two cents, thank you so very much for the thoughtful input. You have no idea how much this is helping me right now and I cannot thank you enough for taking time out of your day to help me out!

FINALLY I have more than one sketch that's worth posting up! I feel real bad doing single dose sketch dumping and since I've been doing alot of work for other people (paid client work thank god, LOL!) I haven't really been able to create much of anything that was truly mine or anything I can release publicly. But now I do so hooray!!

First one was at a convention I attended a couple months ago. I'm really looking forward to moving this piece on to better paper to be watercolored. It looks like it'll be tedious, but a helluvalotta fun!

The next couple were the only sketches I was able to manage while on our cruise a few weeks back. We had one day where we were out at sea all day so Dee Jay and I took advantage of it to catch up on comic work and other art things. When we were winding down I still wanted to draw, so I sketched a few minutes longer before I called in for the day. 2 things; I really miss portrait drawing and 2, I really have to stop eating food with charcoal covered hands, LOL!

This one though...I was so giddy working on this one. We had gone to the art of animation area at Disney and got to take an art session at the animation studio with a bunch of other guests. Normally, they'd do Mickey or any of the rest of the gang, but we had a bunch of people that have already drawn them before. So as the lead was going down the list and came to Flynn's name, everybody swooned (men included!!) So Flynn Rider it is!

I was super anxious to get started and super nervous about it messing up, but I was determined to not suck at art that day, LOL!

CHALLENGE ACCEPTED.

 

finally a breather! it's short, but I'll take it, LOL

Conventions have been keeping us rather busy lately. Our last (and by far busiest) was Megacon! OMG was that ever fun...and frightening! I remember we were setting up Thursday night and I was looking at the other set ups and feeling my blood completely cold because of all the wonderful art up and all over the place. I was actually heavily second guessing whether this convention was a wise choice. Maybe we're not ready for something so big? Maybe we're not at that level yet to compete with vets and newbies alike of this kind of caliber? I was having a borderline panic attack, LOL!

But of course, we've already sunk money into the table so good or bad, we were there all 3 days. OMG I'm so glad we stayed, because it turned out to be a big ball of wonderful! I had no idea we had known so many people from other conventions; and we got to meet lots of new people as well! Got some real good commission requests, sold an original piece of artwork...omg that was one of my favorite pieces too. I miss it alot, but it went to a good friend of mine, so I'm extremely relived that it went to a good happy home!!

We've got alot of work to do now that Mega madness is behind us all. We don't have another con to worry about until april, but that doesn't mean I get a break until then. I've got commissions coming out of my ears and while I'm thrilled that people are nabbing original art, that also means I've got to fill those slots with new stuff! We're gonna be hella busy, but I seriously cannot be any more excited! Things are happening! With the wootness!!

Animation and con hoppin'

I cannot begin to describe how elated we are to say that our animation hermitage may actually be done! We got the opportunity to work on a little animated infomercial of sorts for Mongoose Coding and it came out pretty sweet (if we do say so ourselves!) I loved that the client liked to stay involved in the process and was thorough on what he liked and what could be changed. When it comes down to it, Mongoose Coding was a real treat to work with and we couldn't have been happier to get such a fun project! We can't wait to finally post it up and show it off!

In other news, we've been getting hella involved in the con scene again. Almost as if we've been making up for the years we missed out on while away at college, lol! But it's been SO much fun and challenging. We've even been venturing outside of Florida for some of these, our last one being Ohayocon in Ohio! It was a long drive, but it was hella awesome. We met some awesome people at the con, got some real fun commissions and got to experience a whole new convention environment. We're still testing waters, but I think we're totally going back there next year!

But on to what next on our plate; prepping for MegaCon! This is our first time attending the convention as artists in the Artist Alley, so we couldn't be more excited (and nervous!) for this one. I just hope we'll have a nice little selection of stuff to show off for this, because I have a feeling it's gonna be intense!

Genki

Getting acquainted

with my new to-err, I mean, um....business purchase

Not sure if I mentioned it to anyone here before but as of last month, GenkiGoth Studios has become official and legal her in the Sunshine state. Not huge, to the general masses, but definitely something I'm proud of. We're not just talking about it anymore. It's more than just an organized hobby now. I think the push to get the name and what we do on paper makes the whole act of what we do take a bit more of a serious turn. Not in a bad way mind you, it's just something that I have to keep in the back of my head. We can't think of this as something casual anymore...and I'm kind of happy about that, lol!

Now that we've got the paperwork in order, we've been working on getting ourselves promoted, and figuring out what we need equipment wise to streamline any jobs, projects and/or commissions we're gonna be getting (hopefully, lol!) it's been a pretty long list...and the price tags are sobering. But we've talked alot about it, and what items should take more precedence over others and the one thing that we both agreed that we really really needed was a new computer. Our laptops are SO old, to the point that we can't even update simple net broswing software because our systems are so out of date. Dee Jay's quite tired of getting burned from his laptop (seriously, he has two already) and mine is well on its way to following the same fate. And so, we made our first big investment as co-owners and bought a new computer.

Oh...my...god. Is it ever beautiful! wonderful size, gorgeous color output, it runs like a dream! I'm drooling in anticipation to start my current animation bit on this baby!! My laptop slows down so much because of all the abuse it's taken. Anything over a few gigs and it practically cries. But this...I don't think I'll have any problems animating at all. No lagging, no loud fan whirring, no crashing or freezing. I just love thinking of all the cool stuff we'll be able to do now that we've got some up to date machinery!

But enough of my annoying rambling....artwork awaits!!!

Genki

Ah, the refreshing taste of victory!!!

So, I'm leaving from my day job and one of co-workers says "you're a superhero".
Wait...what?
The scenario he gives me is that we all wake up at the theme park (don't want to name names, LOL) and from oh...a meeting or something and we all have super powers. When I came in, they were deciding who was going to be good and bad. So I've been deemed to be on the justice fighting side.

When it got to what sort of powers we'd all be getting, the were unsure for a bit and then it dawned on them. My powers would be comparable to Thor's; I have super strength that is amplified by mug.

Now, I feel I should provide some back story to this, lol!

I bring a 64oz. jug that I fill up with water every day to work. I work outside in a tiny kiosk and the only thing protecting me (not really) is a sheet of tin over the table (that leaks) and an umbrella (mostly for guests...that leaks) So, it's just me and the heat. I bring that to keep hydrated. I'm ALWAYS getting comments on it because it's so big compared to me. I see it as a very practical item; It's a water jug, an anchor, a dumbell, a travel chair and a bludgeoning weapon, LOL! So in a way, this assigned superpower fits all too well, LOL!

My whole gimmick though is I'll fight with this mug and make super anime victory poses and real corny remarks (like the title of this post, LOL) But OMG I had no idea making a costume would be so hard! I had no real rules to go by, except that it had to be skintight and it had to look kinda american, kinda japanese. Not sure how successful it was, but it was hilarious doing it!

There is no coincidence. Only Hitsuzen. And Mucha.

So I've really been itchin' to try my hand at some more detail oriented, art nouveau-y stuff. Problem is, after looking for references and inspiration, jumping headfirst into my desired project would most likely end in a mess of watercolor and tears. So I figured I'd have to take baby steps. My main references for this was Mucha (of course!!) and of all things, xxxHolic from Clamp. Both are beautiful, detail heavy, and compositionally gorgeous. All things I want to do, all things I feel I need lots of improving on.

The penciling didn't take too long (I had plotted the rough out on a smaller scale in my sketchbook, so I at least had a gameplan to go off of) The inking was a bit tedious though. I completely FUBARed the hair and was really upset about that. Luckily for me, the watercolor strangely masked alot of the inks I had laid down, so it was like cntrl-z-ing a painting, which never happens, lol! There was also the task of inking in all those lines in the BG; there was too much open space to leave there. My eyes gave out quite often and had to take lots of breaks because they were SO hard to focus on! But they came out looking pretty neat in the end.

The watercolors were interesting this time around; I used them on some aquarelle arches paper. Never used the paper before; it was always so expensive (how can I possible justify spending 40 dollars on a pad of paper??) but I found it on sale for half off a few weeks ago, so it was like "ok it's now or never" lol. I was pretty scared when I got it out because wasn't sure how anything was going to behave. I took some getting used to, but I think I'm going to really like that paper. It's smooth and barely buckled at all; the water beaded up on the surface initially and that scared me, but once it settled in the fibers everything was beautifully smooth and rich.

This project required alot of patience on my part, but I'm glad I stuck with it; it doesn't look as bad as I thought it was going to be. Now I gotta figure out something really cool to do for next time!! Well, within reason of course; I can totally see myself trying to run before I can crawl. Baby steps Miriam, baby steps! LMAO!

Genki

rainy days=all day sketch session!

It was raining cats and dogs yesterday. So much so that my job called me to stay home because i'd just be standing at my kiosk getting soaked. So I took the day to draw. I should've done something animation wise, but I wanted some immediate satisfaction, so I decided to start on some pre-planning for a portrait.

It always helps to have a great model and references, and she has all that and a bag of chips, lol! This is Ana Aesthetic; journalist, seamstress, model, actress, cosplayer, con-goer, and a great friend. She's got lots of great poses and costumes I love to look at and reference. But this pic I've been wanting to draw for such a long time because of how nicely those sepia tones might translate in walnut ink. I wanted to dive right in, but I don't want to waste the ink or the expensive paper, so I grabbed my sketchbook and went to work.














Plotting down shapes and getting the gist of the pose down on paper. I love the journey of a finished product, but i don't want to have my finished product to have any evidence of the prep-work. So I can make all my scribbles and mistakes here.

















Got the majority of the pose down, but I didn't like where the hand was close to her face; it looked too far away and the perspective seemed a bit off, so I moved that down and closer to her body. haven't drawn in the gun yet because I'm still trying to get an understanding of the body through that weapon, but there is some line work roughly indicating where it should go. I seem to be having some serious issues with her chest and that left shoulder (her left at least, lol) still seems a bit too wide for my liking.












Continued to futz with the shoulder and chest, kept moving the line work of her jacket to make it fall nicely. I think that was one of the contributing factors of the chest looking so weird. I was also adding in the piping and patternwork of her lacy top too early, so I got rid of it and just focused on the contours of her chest and waist.

Feeling a bit more confident of where things are being placed, I started to cement them by shading things in. I also started adding some more details to the face, light shading, but still not 100% convinced on the angle of the lips and chin. I started to add the gun on the paper but as I made corrections I was erasing too much of what I actually needed. (because apparently, perpective and I are not on talking terms, LOL) I never realized how awesome tracing paper was until my Tools of the Trade class. I use that stuff alot now.




Made some more revisions to her mouth and chin and shoulder, continued to shift her left arm closer to her body and am now working back on the chest, making sure there's some volume there because it still looked awkward to me. Also adding more shading to the areas that i think are ok, and still playing with the placement of that middle finger that's going to be underneath her gun (yeah, I know you still won't see it, but it makes me feel better that I know where it is, lol!













And here it is, on it's last sketching stretch. I've made some more alterations on the waist and its placement, I've been adding more contour shading than linework to the chest so that it looks rounded, added some of little surprises i found while scrutinizing that picture (like the hat above the giant feather and the checkerboard pattern on the cuffs of her sleeves) things I've yet to add are the cameo silhouette on the brooch next to the feather, the detailing of clip at the collar and the patternwork on her corset (although I'm completely at a loss as to how I'm going to do that...it confused the hell out of me) I've also done some more altering on her lip and chin...it kept bothering me, lol! The ear seems to have shrunk and her neck has gotten a bit stiff, but those seem like pretty easy fixes.






Now all I have left to do is to trace this baby on some nice arches paper, plot the shadows and get to painting!!! I can't wait to see what this'll look like finished!

New year, new habits

But god, is this ever gonna be hard...

Made a pretty hefty resolutions list for me (as well as the both of us) and I'm hoping that the more I see it, the more I'm going to want to stick to it. I've had many years where I'd be totally gun ho about something only to fizzle out before the middle of the year. I DON'T want this to happen again this year!

So, here is the condensed version, the strictly creative/business portion of my resolution list:

1. Update and polish demo reel
2. put at least one animation in at least one festival
3. build up our Etsy
4. invest in ourselves (biz cards, postcards, etc.)
5. Publish GGS site
6. Promote GGS
7. Work on art for Art Sale
8. Keep active online
   

While they all sound do-able, these (and the other 10 that I have) are pretty hefty in size. I'm doing my best to break all of these things down into easier to handle baby steps that I know we can both do quickly, together. Some of these things I'd personally like to see done within the next few months...but I know life gets in the way and we can both get real super busy in our own jobs and side projects.

I'm beginning to think that the only way to accomplish any of this will be to channel the MCAD days. We've got to take whatever time we have when we're not at work and work on this stuff to get ourselves up and running.

And, in an effort to keep content, I think I might just start posting art bits (web layouts, WIP's sketches) up to see what you all think. There's many that we'd like to see in the finishing stages but we might be stuck on a certain thing or just not sure what to do anymore with it.

OK! I think I've harassed all of you enough. Thanks for reading!

Genki

We has Etsy!

It's tiny, but it's finally up and we'll be putting stuff up throughout the week. What sort of stuff would you like to see??

http://www.etsy.com/people/genkigoth
http://www.etsy.com/people/gsquareddesigns

Full Circle

So Miriam and I have returned to FL. We are happy to be back even though we will miss our MN family. We are looking for work and finding some! Actually we may be doing concept work for a major theme park in the area, as well as mural work for Terrapin Breweries! We will keep you all posted!


M&D

UNdead

Ok so in the last 168+ hrs of my life, I have slept for 16 of them... But I am proud, proud that I got my work done, proud that I have a very good chance at another straight A semester, and for the first time since I started here at MCAD, proud of ALL of the work I have put out for the end of the semester. The thing that has me the most joyous is my Animation Collab. team. I could never have begged for a better set of members to direct. The dedication was spot on (email was not, lol) the teamwork was hard at times but existent, and the final piece is amazing. Sam, Cheston, Jane, Sarita, Miriam, and Sara, if you guys ever need anything, never hesitate to ask. It was just such a great experience working with everyone. Thanks for the reminder why I became an animator in the first place.

Finished:
Rough final animation
Process book
Most of Rich Girl animation
Complete Identity Package
This website

I feel Good... tired and smelly... but good
-Goth

Up and Running

Things are well as we wind down to the last week of our first senior semester. We are at the half way point of our senior animations ("Overspray" and "Book It" respectively) and quite stressed. It is going to be a photo finish but we are working hard.