The Price of Being a Daredevil

I was rereading an old roleplay and decided I want to do some sketches of Tryvnah. I created him as a major player in Vahaadi's back story but he doesn't appear as a contemporary in any of my story narratives. Which is kind of a shame, I'm realizing, because he's fun to write.

Tryvnah is a djinni like Vahaadi. He's the animal tamer in the circus troupe that adopted Vahaadi as a young runaway, and he's widely acknowledged as the favorite and likely successor of the troupe ring-leader, Zahar (the huge bird-like creature on the right). He's also quite the daredevil. Between his dangerous performance duties and his hobby in free-running, his life story is readily available in his appearance in the form of multiple scars and injuries. Most notably, he got a little to cocky with one of his beasts and ended up losing most of his left index finger when he was twenty.

In the little thumb sketches I tried to capture more ideas of his personality and interests.  Tryvnah's quite a showboat and can seem self-important, but the truth is that he has a very natural self-confidence and a knack for handling just about anything that breathes. He loves animals and is wonderful with children.  He considers all strangers potential friends and all friends potential lovers.  His talent for leadership, team work, and charisma means that he's quite good at getting what he wants while leading others to believe it was their idea.

As talented as he is, he doesn't always get people to eat from the palm of his hand. His relationship with Vahaadi particularly puts him in some tight positions. In the roleplay I wrote with Evie, he ended up facing off with the notorious bounty hunter Marrik. Tryvnah might not have survived the encounter if Spark hadn't saved his butt!

(as usual, the anatomy is out to lunch)

Here, have an excerpt of the RP:

Tryvnah wasn't given a chance to decide on an action before Marrik lunged at him. Tryvnah barely dodged, and almost gave a hoot of self-congratulations when Marrik swung his staff around and jabbed him with such strength and precision in the small of his back that Tryvnah was sure one of his vertebrae had fractured with the impact. He gasped as the momentum knocked him clean off his feet, and when he hit the surface of the roof flat on his chest all of his breath was forced from his lungs. He gasped for air, pain shivering down his limbs from his jolted spinal column. He tried to get up, but the best he could do was roll onto his side, hissing through his teeth.

Marrik kicked him over so that he was lying face up, planted his foot on Tryvnah's chest, and leaned all of his weight onto it. With his free hand he unclipped a canteen and upended its contents on Tryvnah's face and arms. Tryvnah gasped in surprise and flinched as he was doused.

"Do you know what this is?" Marrik asked, returning the canteen to its place and pulling a needle with a syringe from a pouch. He held it over Tryvnah's face so that he could see it. At first glance, the syringe looked empty, but it was actually filled with a thin clear fluid. Tryvnah looked up at it blearily, but with the pain in his back and the weight of Marrik on his breastbone, was unable to respond. "It's just water," Marrik answered himself, turning the syringe over in his hand with a bored tone in his voice. "Hardly more than a swallow. And yet, Fawzild tells me that's all it takes to kill a djinni. One dose to your bloodstream..." He held the syringe threateningly close to Tryvnah's temple. "For all the legends about your kind, you djinn are so frail."

Loose Canon Expressions

Probably needless to say, my New Year drawing ambitions haven't gone according to plan.  Ah well. :) I snatch what drawing time I can.  Here are some recent sketches, trying to get a feel for Vahaadi and Spark's expressions.

My current focus on Vahaadi is sorting out his facial proportions and incorporating his cowl more fully into his look. His eyes have shrunk significantly over the years. I like it; the smaller eyes make him look older and more crafty.

Whereas my goal with Vahaadi is to go tighter and subtler, with Spark I'm trying to capture that wild energy that Evie pulls off so well. Everything with Spark has to be EXTREME!

Shows like Aladdin and Fairly Odd Parents have given Spark unrealistic expectations of what a supernatural BFF should be capable of. XD I'm relatively certain that this is the first time Vahaadi's ever been made to feel as if his power is completely inadequate compared to what she's hoping he could do.

Traditional

Concept illustration of what Took would look like dressed in the traditional garb of his home country instead of the sorcerer/inventor duds he usually sports.  This is for an RP with Evie.

Texture used:
Texture 302 by Sirius-s

After finishing the sketch and having a TERRIBLE time drawing his hands, I did a hand study for him based on a more cartoon-y, American style.  I need to break away from the SailorMoon-look his hands usually end up having.  The trick, I've found, is keeping his wrist tiny but drawing his palm and fingers wide and squared-off.  The result is hands that are spindly but still masculine, rather than delicate.

Sketch Dump

Just trying to compile and organize some sketches I've had kicking around so I don't have 358724651351 million papers to worry about packing and moving every semester.

An old expression study for my OC Kala

 

More recent posing, gestures, and hairstyle experiment for Kala

Yet another experiment with Kala's design and style.  This was inspired by the work of O-mie.  I really like it, but I'm not sure it's going to work for me

This was sort of inspired by an RP with Evie, but I actually mostly wanted to draw Thystle with wet hair

A scruffy, haggard, and furious Vahaadi.  This is a scene from his canon story; he's facing off against Iryl and the Heir.

Working on a concept for Vahaadi's fiend form, based on a savannah cat.

Size Comparison of Vahaadi and his fiend form

First piece of concept art for Tryvnah (QUITE old).  This is him at age 18, when he and Vahaadi met.

Leimira's ponysona, Snake Charmer (or just Charmer). Her cutie mark is a snake coiled in a heart shape.

Study of Fawn from the Tinkerbell movies.  I screencapped a picture of her talking and caught her making this appraising expression.

Bitty chibi Sparks!

I've been meaning to draw Evie's OC Armera for awhile now.  I found this thumbnail sketch I did of her to experiment with her pose and build. Evie once wrote her saying something about having arms like tree trunks, so I think she's probably got some sweet guns like Venus Williams, on account of all her swimming and trident-hefting.

Pretty sure this was another attempt at drawing Holly for AC.

 Design sketch I did for LC

Steampunk Spark I did for a RP idea pitch.  This eventually led into Loose Canon, because this was the first time we considered the idea of Spark getting her powers from Vahaadi instead of a comic-book-esque genetic mutation

And super recent, an unfinished Whirlwind from Skylanders

Vahaadi Sketches

Experimenting with minimalism, chibi, typography, and a modern outfit for Vahaadi.

Some details on Vahaadi's design.

Working on more expressive posing...

More expressive posing, cont.  I'm working my way through ReincarnatedPorano's Body Language Meme; I would have never thought of drawing Vahaadi drunk otherwise. XD He is physically incapable of becoming drunk due to the way his stomach processes food (it's a Ia'lerian Djinni thing.)  And really, that's for the better; Vahaadi can't make good decisions when he's sober, so I can just imagine what he's like when he's smashed.

I'm excited to continue working my way through the meme. It's great practice and it's been really fun to get more in touch with the way Vahaadi acts.  I need to work on ensuring his outfit is consistent from drawing to drawing (I keep shuffling up his jewelry in particular, or leaving out the coins on his right sash) or else come up with new outfits that are obviously distinct.  Which brings me to another major design challenge...

Colors @_@ I'm so bad at picking colors it's not even funny.  This is what I've got for his "usual" outfit so far, but I'm still not sold on it.  My concern in choosing these colors was avoiding black and red so that he won't look color-coordinated to Spark, but as you can see I couldn't resist the red.  I've also been told the white is off-putting. Hmmmm...Another concern is preventing him from looking too much like Aladdin, the Prince of Persia, Sinbad or Flynn Rider.

Anyway, I'm satisfied with how his design and my art are coming along, but there's still work to be done.  Colors, consistency, and alternative outfits are all on the agenda.

But in the meantime, have a My Little Pony Vahaadi. XD

I'm actually really burned out on MLP in general, but I drew this awhile ago and promised I'd share it.  His pony name is Luster because his super special talent is wearing way too much shiny stuff and tricking other ponies into wanting what they shouldn't have. Ho ho ho, double meaning!  He should probably be a unicorn, but I didn't think of it at the time.

GaiaOnline

August 2003 I joined GaiaOnline, and my addiction to the internet began.  Looking back on it, I'm not terribly proud of my involvement with the site because it was an awful time-sink, but it did spur my art, writing, original character development, and creativity in general, and for that, it's been pretty significant to my life. I've been poking around a bit lately, mostly toying with the idea of having an art contest to get rid of all the Gaia items and gold I managed to stockpile in exchange for art of Spark and Vahaadi, but I'm not sure if I even want to do that.  The site is kind of toxic to me.  There's lots of good there, but it requires sifting through lots of bad and basically just getting caught up in the petty social circles of the anime and gaming fandom to find it.  And I no longer need that kind of noise.  Back in the throes of my addiction, I never thought I'd be able to say that, but I can say it now.  And that's pretty liberating. :)

Anyway, as I mentioned, I generated a lot of art for my own use and others' on Gaia. Much of it I still kind of like, or find interesting just to show the (painfully slow) development of my art, so I've compiled it here. I've tried to arrange it in reverse chronological order, so the more recent pieces are at the front and my very oldest are at the end. Like a bad horror film on SyFy, you can watch the quality regress as you go! XD You may notice the art is signed under a handful of different usernames: "o-Raichu-o," "Inkdust," "Ink," or "IridescentInkSpell."  Signing my art with my real name is a very recent development, more or less exclusive to this blog and art that I do for people I know IRL.

Visit the GaiaOnline-inspired Art Archive! Password: inkdust

And for something Gaia-related and far more recent, here's a sketch I did for somebody today of their avatar whilst I was up to that aforementioned poking around. The avatar had really headed-lidded eyes, like he was either wearing makeup or horribly sleep-deprived.  I dunno.

Don't Pay Him Any Attention

I'm working through ReincarnatedPrano's Body Language Meme with Vahaadi as my subject. One of the required expressions is "Silly." This ridiculous scene came to mind.

"I'll be back as soon as I can," Krissy said apologetically, hanging halfway out of the bedroom door to look pityingly back at Vahaadi.

Vahaadi sighed dully.  "And I'll be here..." he muttered, resting his chin on his folded arms. 

"I put your lamp in the living room so you can get around the house," Krissy piped, though she still sounded as if she was apologizing.  She always felt bad for leaving him at home with nothing to do while she was at school. "And you can use the iPad if you want to play Tetris or something--"

Her watch began beeping for the third time.

"Yikes! I gotta go! Sorry! Bye! I love you! I'll be back!"

Vahaadi listened as she thundered down the stairs and out the front door, then shifted his gaze to the small device she'd mentioned. Krissy was able to get the thing to produce all sorts of fantastic "features," but Vahaadi was vastly limited by his inability to read and his ignorance of electronics in general.  Normally he hated dealing with them at all, but he couldn't bear to spend another day in a boredom coma while he waited for Krissy to come back, and he'd already snooped through everything in the house.

He picked up the iPad and flipped it over in his hands a few times before he was able to remember how to activate it. When the screen glowed to life, he flinched at the bizarre digital light. Glassy icons floated on the iPad's surface, and he squinted at each of them, trying to recall how to get to the little game Krissy called "Tetris." Vahaadi was not particularly good at it, but it gave him something to pass the time.

At a loss, he poked at random and found himself staring at a playlist.  He furrowed his brow, and prodded again, then jumped when a catchy percussion rhythm started and three scantily clad women with gray skin began slinking around on the screen on long sleek legs.  Vahaadi stared at the bizarre display, torn between dismay and amusement.

...Several Hours Later...

Krissy paused after she came in the door, trying to hear over her own panting.  Music was playing from her room... She climbed the stairs, opened her bedroom door, and gaped at the bizarre display, torn between dismay and amusement.

Linking because it's big!

Eat your heart out, Beyonce. 

The art didn't turn out like I hoped, but it never does for sequential stuff because I get impatient. These are some crazy dumb poses, but it's a crazy dumb dance, so. XD I referenced from this. Shane Mercado performs "Single Ladies" Vahaadi's build doesn't match his at all, but Vahaadi's a lot more like Shane than he is like Beyonce.

For Cousins

I've decided that if my art never amounts to any more than making the faces of other people light up when they see my work, I'd be OK with that.

This is Janetta, for my cousin Haylee! She's 15 and she loves stories. She's been telling me bits and pieces of her stories while I've been staying with her family this summer, so I drew her protagonist based on those. I'm also working on a color version of this because I completely feed off of her delight as she watches me work.

I also doodled up a quick picture for Halyee's little nephew Damon (her nephew, so that makes him my first cousin once removed? Or something? I dunno, he's my cousin Kimmy's son...).  It is not as polished as Haylee's, but he IS only five, and we all know how five-year-old kids are about waiting for something. X3 He asked me to draw a little boy fighting a dragon (and I feel like I've done something like this before...) for his story. He has yet to tell me this story, as it is apparently very long and he has informed me that it will take two whole days to tell.  The art was influenced by the work of Ben Caldwell because I needed a look that's cooler, more whimsical, and quicker to draw than my own style.

Lined paper for the win.

Kyle Henderson

Concept sketches for one of Krissy's classmates, Kyle! Evie did his original design.

The bottom two poses I referenced from a book called Shojo Fashion Manga Art School - Year 2.  I have to plug for this book and its predecessor, Shojo Fashion Manga Art School, because they are among the best drawing books I own. :D They aren't anywhere near as frilly and Japanese as the name makes them sound, I promise.  If you are of the drawing book perusing sort, check them out!

Let the Crazy Out

This place about to 
blow oh oh oh oh oh oh oh oh, 
this place about to...

This is concept art for Ignite, a doppelganger glitch that is masquerading as Spark. It has all of the same powers as our heroine, with an added dose of freaky. Its hair, outfit and colors may end up being different from Spark's, but for right now they look identical except for Ignite's more sinister mask shape, psychotic, unblinking expression, and the hazy, pixellated quality of its incorporeal body.  Ignite also mimics Spark's voice (though it sounds static-y and its laugh is more shrill) and much of her personality, right down to the cheesy one-liners and possessive disposition toward Vahaadi.  Unfortunately, Ignite didn't imbibe Spark's heroism along with her love for blowing things up.  The masked menace is far more interested in wreaking havoc for its own sake. Enter: a serious problem for the Loose Canon protagonists.

Vahaadi = Spark

I was chatting with Evie and meant to type "Vahaadi + Spark" but I didn't hit the shift and ended up with "Vahaadi = Spark." Personality swap!

Notebook paper for the win.

You're the Reason

Trying to get some life in to Took. As I've mentioned before, he's fun to write--not so fun to draw. :/ I need to fix that. Anyway, this is dedicated to Evie because she's the reason Took is still hanging around. (Is the Chicago song stuck in your head now, is it, is it, is it? :D )

Some notes:

Took's mother received Maridian blood transfusions while she was pregnant with Took, and as a result, he inherited some pretty sweet telekinetic powers that more than make up for his frail physique. He can control two "tendrils" at a time and exert enough force to lift, shove or pull about 150 lbs of weight. If he has to fight, he fights dirty. With some serious concentration he can focus the tendrils into extremely fine filaments. Uses for this technique include manipulating tiny mechanisms (ex. springing a lock or removing a screw without tools) and jabbing people (ex. Vahaadi) because he's a jerk.

Secrets - WIP

This is not how I wanted this picture to look, but I had to get the idea out on paper. This is a non-canonical roleplay scene. Spark's getting a terrible reality check. :(

The lyrics are from One Republic's Secrets.

Creativity Project

For one of my classes I had to make something--anything I wanted, as long as it fell within the school's honor code.  This is by far the best hour I've spent on homework yet. :D

My scanner is not great and this came out of a thick sketchbook, so I apologize for the quality~

Lackadaisical Cat

Vahaadi, in the style of Lackadaisy Cats by stellar webcomic artist, Tracy Butler.

Master

The vivid, inspiring dreams have returned. I dreamed I was walking with Jesus in a cemetery, while the spirits of children that had passed played amongst the graves around us. As I recall, I was in the cemetery to hide from someone, and I was really scared. I was expecting some sort of thug to grab me when I heard the footsteps, but it was Him, wearing plain robes and a cover over his head. He was holding hands with a little boy, and He just looked calmly at me. I don't remember Him smiling, but I felt my heart swell with awe. I stood up and walked toward him. He turned away, but it was in a manner that invited me to follow. As I did, I started to notice the children in the mist, and it was both eerie and supremely beautiful.

...and then the dream took a sharp turn and suddenly Jesus and I were driving home from Walmart together in my car. XD! Not that I wouldn't TOTALLY be down for letting Jesus give me a lift home, but the moment wasn't quite as poignant. But hey, maybe that was part of the spiritual lesson: Let Jesus Drive. Even if it's just for Walmart trips.

More recently, I had a terrifying but really exciting dream featuring my characters Kalarune and Lanthriel, and Evie's Tephra and Vitiator. Occasionally I was Kalarune, and other times I was simply a viewer. Here's a really rough "storyboard" scene of a part very near the end: Kalarune has just been recaptured after a failed escape attempt from her kidnappers, who plan to torture, brainwash, and train the homunculus girl into a hardened assassin. 

In one, a terrified girl was Saved by her Master -- in the other, a terrified girl was enslaved by her master.   

Mistborn

I just finished reading Brandon Sanderson's novel Mistborn: The Final Empire and...um. I still haven't decided whether I liked it or not. I don't generally read adult fiction/fantasy because it seems to be excessively violent, smutty, and/or just plain grueling to read, but this particular book came to me highly recommended, and written by a Creative Writing professor at BYU (land of the prudes, and I say that very lovingly), so, I thought, "how bad could it be?"

...I...I have never read of so much carnage. @_@ The writing was wonderful, and many elements of the story so compelling that I couldn't put it down, but there was at least one night that I lay awake unable to sleep for fear of nightmares. By the time the 500th character was horrifically mutilated I was wondering "WHY AM I STILL READING THIS?" But I finished, and it had a very satisfying ending.

Now I'm torn.  It's the first book of a series, and I have an intense curiosity to know what happens next, but I'm not sure if it's worth stomaching the possibility of seeing more characters get dismembered or flayed or turned inside out or whatever morbidity awaits. I took the second book with me to work today, and I almost picked it up during my long expanse of downtime proctoring Custodial Core--but I lost the nerve and instead drew sketches of some stuff from the first book. I didn't have the book with me for reference, so I just drew from what I could remember of my impressions while reading.

Character Design - Vahaadi

 I recently (ish) listened to a really inspiring podcast from Paper Wings called PWP #9: Five Tips to Make Your Character More Dynamic & Believable.  Of the five tips, the one that really jumped out to me was #2, "A Strong Silhouette is Everything." The podcast recommends taking a collection of objects associated with the character design and tracing their shapes, thereby training yourself to translate those shapes into your character. I thought that was a fascinating idea and decided to try it out myself for my character Vahaadi.

These were all traced from images I found on google. (I'm not slick enough to draw all of these things freehand @_@ ) My compilation includes an example of Persian architecture, Arabic calligraphy, a hookah, a Savannah cat, a scimitar, a diamond-cut gem, stylized flame, a tracing of Jafar's lamp from Disney's Aladdin, stylized smoke lifted from a package of Capri cigarettes, and a bullwhip. Items I would have included but got bored of tracing: scroll, tassel, coins, draping and tattered cloth, sand dunes, needles, pouches, and a gross assortment of jewelry.

Personality and plot wise, I'm pretty satisfied with Vahaadi's development and identity as a unique character, but if he was judged by his silhouette alone he'd be nigh indistinguishable from any other Prince of Persia- or Aladdin- like character.  The only things that make his shape a little different from the others are his tail (which he only has sometimes in partial transformations), his whip, and occasionally I envision him with a magic carpet strapped to his back when he's not using it to travel. I really like that idea, but it's also not terribly practical.  Here's a recent drawing of him. I'm so classy, I drew it on lined notebook paper while I was supposed to be paying attention in church.

I actually drew this because I wanted to try incorporating a cowl into his outfit, and ended up finishing a full figure. I've always liked the idea of Vahaadi wearing some sort of cowl, but I never liked anything I came up with because (and call me a dork if you want) ears are my favorite part of the head, and I missed drawing them when they were hidden. I give full credit for the inspiration for his cowl design to Hunter Bonyun and specifically this drawing of hers. I think it's also worth mentioning that she's one of my favorite artists, and I'm almost positive that Vahaadi's design was inspired by her work long before I ever drew my first clumsy scribble of him years and years ago. Bask in her beautifully detailed work here!

And for your viewing pleasure, here's a really old pic of Vahaadi--this is the first time I tried out the idea of carrying a magic carpet for his travels. This used to be one of my favorite illustrations, but, looking at it now...yikes. The scene depicted is from a scrapped version of his back-story, so he's about 6 years younger than I usually draw him to be.

Here's a much newer and better doodle of his face in profile. It took me about way-too-many years to stop drawing all of my characters with the same nose.

 

Unfashionably Late

My Christmas gift for Evie was unfashionably late (she just received it in the mail yesterday!) so with her present I included a pic of my characters wearing their most hideous yuletide yarns and celebrating the holidays with an ugly sweater party.  Inspiration for these sweaters was gleaned from here.

Characters featured are (from left to right):
Took, undoubtedly rocking out to Justin Bieber's Christmas album -- sweater based on this even uglier one
Iryl -- sweater based on my faltering memory of the Grinch's sweater from the Jim Carrey movie
Kala -- sweater inspired by the one mentioned in the first Harry Potter book that Aunt Petunia tried to force Harry to wear
Lanthriel -- sweater based on any number of tacky over-the-shoulder animal sweaters I have both seen and owned in my lifetime
Balthazar -- the snake's "sweater" (open-ended stocking? leg warmer? detached sleeve?) has the texture of a shag carpet. She is very displeased.
Leimira -- sweater based on this

Vahaadi was supposed to be present, but he um...didn't fit on the paper, haha.  If he'd made an appearance, I'd probably have drawn him wearing something like this if I wanted him to look remotely fashionable, or else I might have just forced him to wear some horrific cat-lady sweater like this. Perhaps he should be very glad he didn't make it to the party.

Kindred Spirit

My friend Brit has her birthday the day before mine, and since I have designated her as a kindred spirit due to our almost immediate bond over similar interests, I drew some of our characters sharing their hobbies with one another.  I still kind of want to clean these up and color them, but I'll post them as they are for now and if I ever decide to make the time to get back to them, I shall! As it, I'm already really late posting these. Our birthdays were in August, haha.

Left, my Thystle, and right, Brit's Bree. They share a love of nature and a common link to Centaurs, as Thystle was originally one, and Bree is half-Centaur. They also have similar hairstyles, as they both have braids tucked behind their ears. n_n They are star-gazing, which doesn't come across well in the absence of any background features whatsoever. I'm actually almost done coloring this one, but the CG colors are not meshing well with the ink lines (which scanned in really pixelated) so I'm going to need to digitally ink it.

Left, Brit's Kess, and right, my Yaraif.  They share cutesy immaturity, purplish hair, and an unapologetic avarice for shiny trinkets. Oh man, this is the first time I've drawn Yaraif in years.  She's an adoptable Roleplay pet/character I won on GaiaOnline, and she was designed by Peipur.  Yaraif used to be my favorite RP character, but somewhere along the way I lost touch and stopped writing her. Hmm. Anyway, for this pic I had to draw Yaraif separately and then shrink her down to fit in Kess' palm.  Here's a full-size view:

She's wearing a big gaudy ring on her head as a crown.

Left, my Took, and right, Brit's Tara. They are both physically frail, selfish, ruthless genius gingers with telekinetic powers.  Oh, and they both have T names! I think that these two actually have TOO much in common, so they'd probably hate each other, and much back-stabbing drama would ensue. Sadly, even though he's ten years older, I don't think Took would win. XD Tara has the power to project hologram-like screens to help her organize her ideas--in this case, some nefarious plot with Took.  I didn't ink all the diagrams and symbols on the hologram screens because I'd like to do so on Photoshop (the screens glow, so it's going to be a great lighting practice!) but if you squint really hard and turn your head sideways and know in advance what I was intending, you could see that the screen to the right of Tara bears a really simplified version of the map of Magic Kingdom. Maybe these two schemers are just planning a trip to Walt DisneyWorld.

"Fantasyland must be our first conquest--my research indicates that the wait time for Peter Pan becomes intolerably long after 10 am."
"Yes, but if we pick up a Fastpass, we can go to Jungle Cruise first. No one thinks to do that first thing in the morning, so we'll have no wait and the benefit of the cooler morning temperatures."
"We need to ensure we have sunscreen in our arsenal."
"Sunscreen, shmunscreen. Let's just kidnap a weather Mage and make them conjure an overcast day."
"I like it. Can I do the honors?"

Left, Vahaadi and right, Brit's Lyra. As a mortal, Vahaadi occasionally made an honest living for himself as a tailor/dress-maker and Lyra is a fashion-designing thread Mage.  Drawing this pic was bizarrely relaxing, so even though I'm not thrilled with how it turned out, I like it just for the process it required to make it.