J179 – Season 2 Cover Page

[1/29/2007] Alright, so I finally got this one done. Well, I only started a week ago, and the net time was probably only a few days. This isn’t too bad. Also, I was trying a new technique that was an extention of the one shown in last week’s update. Basically, I draw the lineart on paper, then scan it in, then outline it in Macromedia Flash (hooray for vector graphics!), then export the lineart as a JPEG and color it in OpenCanvas. Then go to Photoshop for final tweaking and export. So basically … the image passes through 3 programs, going through one of them twice. Yippee.

Anyway, now on to actual ranting. Man, I hate that clock tower. It was okay the first time I drew it, but every subsequent time I’ve had to draw it I mentally bash myself for making it have so many details to replicate. This time was no different; I probably spent more time inking the clock tower than anything else, except perhaps the ship. Not sure why that was particularly difficult, either.

I also experienced no end of issues with drawing on the wrong layer in OpenCanvas, and then either being unable to delete or deleting some other stuff on the layer by accident. Perhaps I should just use one layer per color from now on or something.

Speaking of color, I’ve discovered I’ve been horribly, horribly inconsistent with the colors of J and D’s eyes. In fact, I think D has actually been drawn colored more often. At any rate, in past appearances D’s eyes have been both grey and purple, and J’s eyes have been both grey and blue. Keeping with the trend, I decided to compromise and use both colors at once. I am hereby declaring this the official standard for myself. I hope.

C080125

[080128]

Today’s update is an illustration and there’s another one coming along if it ever gets done. For those of you with a DeviantART account and feel like generously leaving a comment (yeah right), here is a link.

So I’m more happy with this one than I’ve been with the past few illustrations, especially when it comes to the result/time ratio (which is important when there’s other stuff to be done and clearly not much time to do it all. Factor in inefficiencies (ie distractions) and stuff gets ugly). The actual pencil drawing took about an hour and a half, digital inking an amazing just under an hour and coloring about four hours.

Not to steal any of J’s thunder, but he’s working on a painting at the moment and his digital inking… well it took longer than an hour XD.

Anyways, this is the third colored piece using this illustration process, the first two being Chikara colored and the last ToTA fanart. While the lineart ain’t anything special the coloring gives off some interesting stuff here and there.

Some random computer stuff; here’s a screen of my current desktop [100613: Dead link]. The picture’s from some Haruhi related DVD thing. Too bad Yuki doesn’t get much spotlight XD.

And since I’ve got a replacement (read “new” hand-me-down) camera here’s a picture of my relatively new computer case [100613: Dead link]. This was a steal with a $70 rebate and a huge improvement over the cheap piece of crap I had before. Desktop/server doesn’t compete with the AC in noise anymore XD

J178 – Coloring Experiment

[1/22/07] Hey everyone. Sorry for the late update. I really was short on ideas, so I decided to try something based on a coloring experiment I had tried. Unfortunately, I’m not done with it yet. The experiment, however, has been posted for today’s update. You may recognize the lineart from the sketch of “Old-school J-san” in this update. Basically, the lineart was done in Flash (hooray, vector graphics!) and the coloring was done in OpenCanvas. The resulting image has been color-adjusted in Photoshop to create a better color balance. Anyway, although the lineart wasn’t the greatest (it looked better as a sketch), I’m pretty pleased with the coloring itself. Hence, I’m trying it again. You’ll probably see the result next week. Until then, ciao~! 

dcomic 452

[080120]

So. These recent comics are leading into my relatively novel part of the story. Honestly I had a lot more fun drawing this segment than most other segments. Art quality is pretty throughout as well and there’s two experimental strips coming up… which foreshadow two more experimental strips further down the line. Which may not actually be experimental at all…

Anyways, things going pretty damn slowly on the drawing scene. The new comics (with experiental process) take forever to draw… and I’ve got a few paintings I wanna do but they just aren’t coming together. And I’ve been having extended periods of “just don’t want to do anything at all”. And the tablet is a pain to lug around. And…

My camera died a rather uneventful death between now and november. It was a Sony DSC-T1 that I’d had for a good two or three years now (hand-me down of course) and last month it started to give my photos a wierd tint. I thought it was a setting I’d screwed up so I finally took it home and found out how to reset it today. Now you just see a bnunch of fuzzy lines instead of what you’re taking a picture of. Rather unfortunate I daresay. I liked that camera.

It’s because it’s Sony.

Anyways, a bit longer today, but nothing special. Time to go eat.

J177 – Pie; Silverware

[1/14/2008] Hooray! Today’s comic is comic number 2^7 for me! Anyway, today’s comic was though up while sitting bored in a lab. It doesn’t mean much of anything, but basically describes my situation before I drew the thing. The random cutouts are somewhat inspired by the Pani Poni Dash! anime.

Anyway, not much to say this time; it’s snowing again out here. Yippee. Cold.

dcomic 451

[080111]

So. 451. Drawn up to 468.

I don’t have anything to write at the moment and I think I’d rather eat my pie and watch my anime than think of something to write. So I’ll go do that.

J176 – Funky Anime; A Hero Emerges

[1/7/2008] Hi everyone! I’m back at college again. Today’s 4koma arose from a discussion with Sam about [SPOILER] [SPOILER]. I won’t be able to explain exactly how we got to the comic from, what we were talking about, but basically Sam said, “You don’t make guns that shoot medicine at people” (In fact, such things do exist).

Hence, today’s comic.

While I was working on the 3rd panel of the second comic, I suddenly thought to myself, “Wait, why the heck did I just use these two random characters for the people who got immunized in the comic? Couldn’t I have just used D and J?” Ah well. At least now, it fits in the “Funky Anime” collection of comics.

dcomic 450

[080107]

First of all, compilations for parts 3 and 4 can be found here [100613: Dead link]. They’re both like 6MB at 50kb/s. Although with an extra 100MB of space costing [$3?] on freepages there isn’t much point hosting this on my own for now.

With Colette doing permanent server duty I’ve considered getting a new desktop together… but again there isn’t much point. I figure I’d only need a new processor, motherboard, GPU and PSU; something low end (yet still more powerful than the laptop) would still run me less than 300. With a good E2140 I could potentially get a 3GHz dual core… which is more CPU than I’d ever need unless those PS2 emulator guys get their act together.

As for the compilation, I got part 2 redraws done through 390. Regular comics starting with 465 are finally getting under way again… but the quality leaves something to be desired lately. Though it’s looking up from the redraws, which is a relatively good sign.

Anyways I’ve been really tired these days and the first day of class is tommorrow. Oh joy.