FallCon 2012

This weekend, I set up shop at FallCon! Let me just start off by saying-- I think it's really difficult to portray my excitement through text. I'd rather let my face, voice, and bounciness tell you the story of the convention. But alas... I hope I can give you an idea here of how utterly delightful this experience was.

This was my display! My Sailor Moon picture out in front attracted many a little girl to my table. I didn't know kids these days were even watching Sailor Moon! One, maybe nine years old, bragged to me about all the issues of the manga she owns, and began quoting all of the attack names. Another, I gave some free art to, because she was only FIVE or something, LOVED Sailor Moon, and her parents weren't going to buy her anything. I made her day, and that gave me something more valuable than money.

Aang from Avatar the Last Airbender

Big Daddy and splicer from Bioshock

Normally, I cosplay at conventions. However, I find that it feels pretty weird sitting behind a table in a costume. You know? Putting on a costume makes you want to run around and explore and be that character for a while. It's magical! But in artist alley, I want to be 100% me. So, I realized, this is the way to enjoy cosplay while in artist alley-- by celebrating other people!

Lately, I've been feeling that I ought to begin accepting commissions. I took it as a good omen when a couple people requested commissions of me and I wasn't even advertising them! They were so much fun to do. And I'm so happy that I got to make other people very happy with custom artwork. What a "wow" feeling.

The first request was for a custom Yu-Gi-Oh card. I got to pick one of his existing cards, white out the image, and draw in my own. He made it clear that I could draw absolutely anything I wanted, and suggested I could do one of my original characters! How awesome is that, right? He even left me his paint markers, since I had no suitable supplies with me.  I chose a card called "dust tornado" and drew my character Autumn, blowing a great big swirl of wind from her cupped hands. The second request was from a lady who wanted me to draw a portrait of her lovely obitsu doll. So pretty!

What a day. The time flew by. I wish there were more conventions like this. Not only is it fun, it's free for artists. That meant no worries about breaking even! Nothing but awesome. Thanks for tuning in, guys! My next convention is Anime Fusion: Oct' 19th-21st!

P.S.--- A word of thanks to my amazing table-mates-- writer Christa Yelich-Koth and artist Conrad Teves. They enriched my experience with lovely talk of art and stories of their collaboration. Also, Conrad lent me his white-out pen, without which I could NOT have pulled off that Yu-Gi-Oh card!! Thank you!

Dr Sketchy's Sept.'12

Life drawings I made during last month's Dr Sketchy's. The colored pencil drawings on the left are one-minute sketches. The center two were drawn during a 15 minute pose. The rightmost drawing, I had a whole half hour to do. I never know quite what to do with all that time-- so I normally just draw the pose twice. So much to learn! Dr Sketchy's is always my favorite life drawing session. Pretty ladies,  with costumes and without, are just so fun to draw! This model's name is Electro-Cute. During the one-minute poses, she wore a gorgeous black sequin dress, had a long fur draped over her, and wore a stack of ten or so pearl necklaces! (Perhaps you can see the necklaces real lightly in my sketches? They're massed together into a scarf-like clump.) The thing about Dr Sketchy's is that there's never enough time to draw the costume before the model takes it off. Which is good, because it keeps you focused on drawing the figure!

Nabucco - Opera Sketches

The Minnesota Opera has begun it's new opera season, and it's first show is Verdi's "Nabucco"! The story, "...follows the plight of the Jews as they are conquered and exiled from their homeland by King Nebuchadnezzar (Nabucco)."--Minnesota Opera

 I attended the final dress rehearsal with my fellow Black Hatters, to sketch the night away. Watching the opera and sketching at the same time is challenging. Add to that subtitles that must be read and, well... Unfortunately, I missed out on some plot points. But oh, the sights and sounds were simply marvelous! The costumes, sets, and singing are totally enjoyable even without an understanding of the Italian words. Such grand performances just fill my spirit right up with bright, burning goodness.

Below: Abigaille, older daughter of Nabucco

Above: Fenena, Younger daughter of Nabucco, and the High Priest of the Hebrews

I've had the honor of attending several of these dress rehearsals in the past, and I'm still working out the best way of capturing the magnificence of it all in my sketchbook. By nature, I am incredibly slow at everything, including sketching. This time, I tackled the job with my brush pen. First, I drew a rough impression with pencil. Then, I quickly attempted to give the characters more substance and form with ink. The result was far fewer sketches than usual, but all of them are way more complete looking than usual. This has been my first round of opera sketches that I didn't feel the need to work back into afterwards. Yay! 

Star Field ~ Doodle

Good night, and sweet dreams!

Bloom and Grow - Pencils

Just a little mini comic I whipped up last week. It's pencil on vellum. My process of working normally  involves layers of tracing paper, but I decided to try vellum this time instead. I like how the graphite sticks to it! The idea to try vellum was inspired by Anna Bongiovanni's comic, Moon Baby. 

This little mini is destined for some watercolor! I'm going to paint the flowers back to health; they'll change from a crispy yellow to a puffy pink. I was inspired by my mom's flower garden while visiting home. They were lovely and I hated the thought of them withering during the coming chilly season. I want to keep them beautiful forever with my paint!

Princess Serenity

It always feels good to sit down with watercolors. Photoshop is magical for painting, but even with a cintiq, the feeling isn't quite as satisfying as having paint on paper. So~ here's Princess Serenity of Sailor Moon! Minus her poofy sleeves. I figured, the sleeves are detached from the dress, so she must have to put them on separately. So, as she's getting ready at the beginning of the day, or in the evening, winding down, she may look like this. Or hey- maybe some days she doesn't feel like wearing poofy sleeves! Here's the lovely model who was the inspiration for this piece- Saraqael.

Metacon

Yaaay! Last weekend I shared a table in Metacon's artist alley with my friend, Dennis Lo! I sold some new bookmarks and prints and met other cool artists, including my alley neighbors, Jen Riehm and Leandra Cota. To everyone who stopped by, thank you so much! The very best part of artist alley was talking with everyone! Thank you also to all of my friends who have done this before-- you gave me very good advice on how to be prepared and how to not be nervous. I know to never be without snacks, plenty of change, and yummy coffee to keep me chipper!