Long time, no update. I’ve been busy busy busy, mostly because on top of part-time work and doing “The Dreaming”, I’ve also picked up some illustrations for a company. Oh my god. No time to do ANYTHING at all. More on that in the future – many announcements to make. I seem to be experiencing server problems though. It takes forever to load my site up for some reason… I may have to start looking for a new server. No matter how great Jason and Silver Bullet Hosting has been, I think I’ve got to start looking for more bandwidth, especially since I’m going to put some video clips online.

New Manga: As I said in my previous post, I sent “The Two Dollar Deal” around on my fanlisting, which is growing, thanks to Emily Shao (YAY! Emily!). However, if you missed it, it’s now officially up on my site at here. It’s a short 8-page manga “cute romance” story, much like “Greenhouse”, mostly because it’s done for the same anthology (Generation 2006 this time).

Wirepop Calendar: WAY late announcement, but Wirepop is putting out a new calendar! I’ve got June, and I finally get some “Block 6” colour art done, though pages… getting there (ahem).

Chaos Code: I had to mention this. “Chaos Code” is a 2D-fighting game I’m working on, which is my part-time job, for a company called “FKDigital”. Based here in Sydney, it’s got about 11 people working on a tonne of art for a fighting game that’s to be released for the Japanese and SE Asian market. The game art is coming along BEAUTIFULLY, thanks to all the amazing artists there, and the reason why I’m so excited is because the game engine is finally “done”. By “done” I mean I’ve finally seen the game in action, though there are a number of minor bugs that still need to be fixed. Up until then, I’ve been colouring frames, doing backgrounds and drawing background characters, never seeing what it all looks like put together. And when I finally saw it WORK, it looked so pretty that I was stunned. Sure, I’ve seen all the art, but having the near-final product… I could have jumped for joy. Part of the reason is that the game engine has been delayed for about a year, because the programmers in Japan took forever to ham it together. And so, I’ve been working all this time with no idea what the hell’s going on. But now… it’s so rewarding to see the GAME actually WORKING (mostly).

I’m afraid I can’t show any art from the game yet, because it has to be shown at a Tokyo gaming show before the public sees any part of it. So far the game is NEARING completion, which doesn’t say much… but at least we’re no longer doing backgrounds but doing background characters. The backgrounds are mostly done, which is a VERY good sign. The background characters I’m currently working on are from Chinatown, which means a stackload of cliches… but very fun to do.

Me on Television: I was on ABC TV on 2nd April, 2006. And I forgot all about it too – my parents taped the interview, which was part of the Otakulture Exhibition. “Sunday Arts” was the program that did the interview, and it was a load of fun. The segment is very short, but I shall put it online when I finally get the video clip editted and working on a computer properly. It’s basically me blabbering about “The Dreaming”… I actually look okay on television. Everyone says I look better than I do on TV than in real life. I should just quit manga and become a news reader. By the by, I’m going to be doing an artist’s talk when the Otakulture Exhibition comes to Sydney, currently scheduled for the 13th May. More on that later.

Book Signing in Canberra: This is way late, but it was a great deal of fun and I gotta thank Mal and Impact Comics for organising the whole thing! I bought some stuff as well, especially Trudy Cooper’s “Platinum Grit”, a truly funny comic she’s been drawing for a long time. And lovely to meet Nicola Scott, who has amazing art skillz, and great to see Liz Argall again, who writes some really great stuff.

The Dreaming (Vol2): Going to plan, and now working on the cover. I’ve now had to pencil the whole book before I do any more inking, but so far I’m up to the middle of Chapter 13, and the last chapter is 14. I’ll definately get it finished by the end of April, and then it’s inking time! The book is still coming out in November this year, so everything’s right on schedule.

It’s been a long time since my last update, and apart from being busy, I’ve also been besieged by a number of technical problems. Computer failures, hard disk failures, blackouts…all intent on happening when you least expect them to. I still haven’t fixed it yet, because I encountered the Windows Blue Screen of Doom twice yesterday. I guess the bad news is, I may have to get a new hard disk, and then reinstall crappy windows. The good news is, Warcraft III still works.

Book signing: There’s going to be a book signing for “The Dreaming” in Canberra, on Saturday March 11th. The place is Impact Comics, and it’s a “Aussie Comic Creators – Wonder Women” event, 3 days after International Women’s Day. It’ll be a showcase of 4 Australian women comic creators, which apart from me, includes Trudy Cooper, Nicola Scott and Liz Argall. I must say I’m looking forward to meeting everyone. Those who are fans of Trudy’s Platinum Grit can either show up or die of jealousy. And I met Liz at Supanova, so I’m looking forward to seeing her again. So:

What: Book signing for “The Dreaming”
Called: “Aussie Comic Creators – Wonder Women”, also meet Trudy Cooper (Platinum Grit), Nicola Scott (Penciller for alot of US comics) and Liz Argall (Writer for Aussie Anthologies)
When: Saturday, March 11th, 12:30pm
At: Impact Comics!
Address: Level 1, 45 East Row, Canberra ACT 2601
Phone: (02) 6248-7335

The Dreaming: The script is all done, the second book is due for a November 2006 release, and I’ve finished Chapters 8-9 completely! *Fanfare* There’s still 5 chapters to go, but here’s hoping to hire some friends as toners so I can speed up the rather sedate process of using the magic wand, and then the fill tool. They have to prove that they can tone like me first, so I’ll probably ink some chapter 10 pages and have them cut their teeth on that. Sample pages – as you can see, I’ve eschewed the digital balloons for hand-drawn ones, which look better. More organic, and with better tails.

Working on it: Here goes my new art style. Remember the good old days when I never toned much of anything, and drew pure black and white comics? I wish those days would come back, but it seems that even when I try and do high-contrast imagery, I can’t escape the tone monster. That said, I’m not working towards a more mature, photo-realistic style of art. Haven’t got it pinned down yet, as the below picture will attest. One thing about photo-realism is that (a)you need thin and thick lines in the fight places, and no lines in certain places, and (b)you need a photo reference. I had neither in the picture below, not to mention a number of minor lighting and anatomy problems. I also used a brush pen, which I shouldn’t have if I weren’t familiar with it.

First of all, it wsn’t done with a photo reference, so the lighting is all mucked up for the house in the background. Secondly, the contrast of gradient tones isn’t strong enough, leading to a washed out grey look about it which makes it not as striking as it should be. Unfortunately, the ComicWorks tones I used for this doesn’t have very good gradient tones, so for now there’s nothing I can do about it. I also overlaid 2 screen tones on the dress, which = disaster in print. And the same neck-and-arm anatomy problems are still there. That said, I’m now downloading some high-contrast greyscale images of Old Town Macau to use as practice, to see whether I can get the contrast of black, white and tone right if I use a photo-reference. I think it’ll take a few more tries, but I’ll post the results up here.

Baseball Manga: This was fun. It’s the first time, I’ve directly imitated the drawing style of another artist (for good reason, but it’s secret), and I’ve only got the line thickness and toning whacked. I think the original was done with brush pens, but I need a better PDF version of the original before I can determine that. The toning is dodgy, probably be cause the tones in ComicWorks (once again) wasn’t fine enough, and the scratchiness of the look doesn’t help either. It’s mean to be a smoothly reflected helmet, but it doesn’t look it. Bah. That said, I didn’t copy this. I “borrowed” the art style to create a whole new panel.

That said, does anyone know recognise this art style? The originals were sent to me by PDF, so I don’t know which manga this is or who drew it. It looks familiar though, like Kaiji Kawaguchi’s art, but I can’t be sure. He’s a vey skilled artist though, and quite frankly, trying to draw as well as he does is difficult. It’s not the line thickness or toning, which can be fixed – it’s the precision inthe anatomy. The original manga had a great grasp of anatomy, and that’s where I fall short. It’s one thing doing cartoony people, but I seriously felt the differences when I drew this. Time to dig out the anatomy books again. I need it for my photo-realistic art anyway.

Radio Interview with me: I don’t listen to the radio, but my Triple J Interview was indeed played on radio, and was heard by people. I know because someone posted here to tell me about it, and later posted the link too. Thanks to Fiona Hogg for this interview. I remember when it was taken too – in my hotel room with a portable electronic recorder thingo that Fiona had just been given by Triple J.

The Dreaming: There’s a positive review of the book already up at AnimeFringe.com!

Article at Newsrama: It’s mighty strange to be called “Chan”… not least because there are so many “Chans” around. I would prefer to be called “Queenie”, not least because there are alot less “Queenies” around. Anyway, to be fair, AnimeBoredom is running the transcript of the interview if you want that version.

2D-fighting game: Most of you may know I now work part-time at a gaming company, colouring animation frames for a 2D-fighting game. The game is called Chaos Code, and will be published in Japan and South-East Asia by Arc System Works, which is the company that published Guilty Gear. It will be released in PC format, because despite being quite suitable for PS2 and the XBox, the game is meant to be available for online challenges. The PS2 has internet connection, but it’s not a fast enough connection to play fighting games on (RPGs okay), so the game wasn’t developed for either the XBox or PS2 because there’s not much point in ONLY developing it for the XBox. It costs money, you know, to reprogram the game to a console.

I’m unable to show any art, because the project is co-owned partly by the publisher, and no promotions are to be done without their approval. However, I can tell you how this small company in Sydney managed to snag a contract with a big Japanese gaming publisher. The company, called FKDigital, started off with a couple of guys who liked to draw, and then one day decided to do “art with a purpose”. They’re obsessed with 2D-fighting games, so they decided to make one themselves. And it was when Arc System Works saw this fan game, that they decided to hire these guys, who just went on to form a studio. Quite frankly, this is a very impressive game.

The game is made in KakutouTsukuri, which is like the 2D-fighting version of RPGMaker. I know all about RPGMaker so I understand the mechanics behind this game, and people who have RPGMaker knows that it can have error messages show up when you load it to non-RPGMaker installed systems. Well, same problem here. The game will work beautifully on some computers, and be real buggy on others.

New Art: I’ve gained myself a new idol. I want to draw like Kentarou Miura of Berserk. I kid you not. His art is fantastic, and despite not having an ounce of feminity to it, is able to express emotional moments very well. Berserk was always my all-time favourite violent manga, but after having the chance to sit down and actually read it from the beginning to vol28, I have to say I am floored by the skill of the art. I’ve always loved black and white art, with cross-hatching, and I adore fantasy stories as well. So I actually bought volumes of Berserk just so I can copy the art.

This is the first time I’ve EVER wanted to directly copy a manga-artist’s art – quite frankly, up until now, I have NEVER attempted to open a manga and copy what’s inside. I made it a point not to, because if I did, my art will end up being a copy of that artist’s art, and back when I was trying to find my own style, I decided it would be a very bad thing. So, I have a great deal of aversion to copying another artist’s art. Even now, I’m only studying Berserk art and putting it down before drawing it.

Girls wanting to draw in the Berserk style must be quite rare, but I can’t help it if I like sweeping canvases, illustration-level drawings and adventure stories. Explains why I’ve never had great passion for “typical shoujo”, though there’s alot of good shoujo out there. I prefer a strong, muscular style of story-telling that is solid, tells you what’s going on without going Super-deformed, and about complex issues. This calls for a more “serious” and “mature” style of art, so perhaps now is a good time to start practicing. And besides, I need all the help I can get on anatomy anyway.

More Zelda FanArt. This is probably what Link will look like if he ever ended up (Nintendo forbid) in Berserk.

None of these took me very long to draw – but they’re hard because I have to THINK about it. I also had to even adjust the wireframes, because a more realistic style of art calls for… a more realistic drawing style. Which is something I lack training in, and god, self-teaching myself is damn hard!