onna's scratches and scribbles

I actually have been working on something else besides "GQ" with cg. And I have done something a little more suggestive than usual.

Here is the latest, Candlelight at Midnight. The resource pic is a two and three-quarters inch square photo from rat's 1999 Playboy Hardbodies mag. This is pretty much straight-forward pencilwork. Of course, the large version is more in focus. These little thumbnails are fuzzy.

Since I was not happy with how the pencil scanned this time, I decided immediately to add colour. I prefer using PS6 when using the airbrush and the tablet because I have more control. I haven't been able to figure out how to get the same kinds of settings in PS7. I like airbrushing the hair so I worked on the majority of the colouring in PS7 then moved over to PS6 for the detail work.

I added the dark blue to help pull the background together more and I think the colour helps pull the skin shading together better as well.

I will be sending the large files to the usual suspects later.

Figured I should at least put out the line art of "GQ" so you know it does exist...

As usual, when I shrink the piece, the image gets a little fuzzy, no matter how hard I try to make it otherwise. The lines are a lot more crisp and clean in the large scan. I guess I need to rescan my images smaller and use them as the thumbnails.

The photo used as a reference point is from an October 2003 Maxim. The two fashion models were actually on opposite sides of the photo and the model for S had dredlocks.

~edit~
This image has not been sent to the 'usual suspects'. I am waiting for the toned piece to be finished.

Stayed in bed today and finished a pic. Seems the muses were staying away yesterday because of my slight fever (99), not because they were being flaky. They don't like it when I am ill.

I have scanned the image in and I don't like the scan. The pencil work is really apparent in the scan - LOTS of black - so I am going to try a rescan later. If it doesn't work, I will have to do some cg adjustments to help smooth everything.

Anyway, you will just have to wait a little longer for the latest pic, "Candlelight at Midnight".

*glares at art muse*

Okay, Evan, what's up with you? You have me in the middle of all this art and now you are petering off on me, right when I am taking a bloody vacation to devote to creativity?

*Evan stands by the wall, looking ashamed*

Let me guess, Grunt gave you a tumble and now he wants a piece of me?

*Evan blushes, while in the far, far corner, Grunt of the Horrible Stench grins with rotting teeth*

Nope, I need a few more days with Evan, to finish up some artwork first, then Grunt can have me for writing. Is it a deal?

*nothing is heard*

I said, is it a deal?

*still nothing*

IS IT A DEAL!!???!?!??

*nothing*

Damned muses....

Art Status

In one of the current sketchbooks I found an abandoned sketch and began futzing with it yesterday. It actually started coming together for some reason. Am thinking about putting clothes on the boys for this one, to avoid dealing with the arm details.

I also worked on two other pieces yesterday, both more steamy than the usual fare.

All was done in-between lots of sleeping.

Bad weather kept me off the computer until the evening. Worked on more solid toning for "GQ", concentrating on skin shading. Didn't do much tonight and stopped when I was basically blobbing tone on E's face quite sloppily. Hurray for putting each piece of shading/toning on a separate layer. I just erased the mess and closed the file.

Completed the inking of "GQ". Scanned last night, did cleanup and began putting in textures and tones on the clothing. I will probably 'exchange' the fills between S's vest and E's pants because I like what came out on S's vest. E's coat has three layers of fills; two texture fills and one solid fill.

The plan is to attempt to figure out the fold shading method P.L. Nunn and Ponderosa use. I believe it is a marque selection with a clear-to-black gradient, which is then faded out with the opacity tool to get the various shade strengths of the folds. Yet another experimental piece.

Went through one of rat's 2000 Playboys last night, tearing out ads and pages with interesting pics that may be referenced in the future for various drawings.

Inked more on the "GQ" pic tonight, then used Japanese white ink to fix the booboos and re-inked some sections.

I wish now I had scanned it prior to inking, then again when S was inked with bad hair, and the new hairstyle changed with black and white ink.

I hope to finish inking the drawing tomorrow, after the white ink is completely dried. Then it is into the computer for a lot of cg - fabric textures, shading, highlights, and then I will have to hunt down some kind of background. I wonder if I should borrow a digital camera and go downtown for a few shots for this one. I only use photos I have actually taken myself, so since I haven't been to Tokyo, I am going to have to fake this one. Either that, or try and make it look like a studio shot.

I am also working to get more of my older Gravi pics ready to post on the website. I am trying to get them set up so instead of sending pics in to some of the pending contests, I can just give them a link.

I need to re-do them all smaller for WordWrights as well.

No heavy writing is happening, though I have a few snippets being whispered in my ear and I write them down.

I forgot I had finished this at the con.

I am calling it 'Portraits'. It's just a little pencil study using oekaki shading techniques.

It's nothing special. I started this back in March as a study of S's hair and eye at a profile, mostly just for practice. I added E for the hell of it, and he has that 'Mirage of Blaze' look about him.

I was also working a little on face size proportions, trying to make sure they were close to the right size compared to each other. E's eyes are a little high on the face, oh well. I guess if had shortened the nose and moved the mouth up a little it would have looked better. I am not too concerned about it.

I used the various shading techniques I have been using with oekaki to pencil shade this time. This made the shading more simplistic than usual.

I kinda like how they are 'sharing' a shoulder line.

I wonder if Matsuo would find this an interesting composition to paint... LOL! (reference to an OC in imayb1's Gravitation fics) I'm kidding!

After I scanned this tonight and cleaned up the scan, I decided to try and colour it in Photoshop, again attempting to use some oekaki techniques.

I consider these studies more than actual official pieces of 'art'.

Will send the bits to the usual suspects, probably tomorrow evening. Time to go to sleep now.

The next Gravi pic I have started has a GQ feel to it. I am using a photo in one of rat's old Maxim magazines for the source. Last night I was considering inking this one and I might do it. S's face looks a lot like the work of for some reason in this piece.

The more sultry pic started last week is currently at a stand-still. I suspect I will get back to it next week. It is going to take a lot of pencil and stump work to get the feeling I am wanting to convey. The muse still asks me if I really want to use pencil. Evan is trying to convince me to ink it and try to use tones to get the same effect. I am still hesitant.

I have some 'almost' finished Gravi pieces I think I will complete soon and get posted so they are out of the notebooks. I fixed a mouth on one piece that has been sitting for a year so that one may make it out soon. It is part of the Lemon Tree series, and I have been working on getting those pics posted at the website. I need to send the explanation blurb to the parties who also participated in the RP and see if they want to add to it or adjust it.

I look at my dbz sketchbooks a little guiltily..., but the urge to complete the large stack is not as urgent as getting Gravi pics done.

# fucked up by bakayaro onna : 10:26 AM
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The latest, "Snow Lick".

I began with a reference line drawing from the "How to Draw Manga-Couples" then added the hands, hair, muscles, light source, shadows/highlights, pillow, fabric wrinkles, etc.

As usual, the thumbnail does not show the subtle details. Shiyuu's tongue is almost not seen here. The gradient has crosshatch, the sheet has a grid texture and the pillow has a dot texture. The usual suspects will get a much larger version of the pic in their email shortly.

My critique:

On Shiyuuichi:
S's hand is too small and I don't think I got the position of S's head just right. I like how the hair finally shaped up. Back in January, when I started this, S's hair was not working at all. I have a better handle on S's hair now. And S's nose is not perfect, but it looks better than what I had before.

On Eiri:
I like the relaxed passion in E's face. He has let go of having to be in charge and is enjoying receiving S's loving licks. The hair was fun to do, all frazzled and a little sweaty. I wanted to add more detail to the face but I also wanted the light source to be above, so the face remained simple.

Have completed another drawing, the one begun 1/20/04 and left in the sketchbook for a semester and pretty much ignored. rat says it looks better now that I have added a lot of hair detail and some environment, though he still does not think it is one of my better pieces. The hand is still small and I am not going to futz with it.

I will be scanning it in this weekend and sending it out to the usual suspects, after I decide whether or not I will cg-enhance any of it after scanning.

I am going to call it "Snow Lick", which may give a little clue about content, but it is not as racy as you might think. I haven't done many hard-core pieces in the past, only because I cannot get the mechanics right and I only recently have I found some photo resources which are m/m.

The latest pic I began last week keeps taunting me to ink it like the last piece, since I enjoyed doing the inking and toning so much.

That is not the plan. I want to do a mood piece with lots of dark pencil and just a few areas where the charas are lit. It is supposed to be a candle-lit bedroom. I think I will have to attack it with a 6B pencil to shut up my muse.

Instead, muse, help me figure out the perspective and foreshortening for that portrait shot, damnit!

Got Word 97 installed on the craptop last night. Put my 'Mine' icon as wallpaper at the moment, since I found it on one of the floppies floating around. I will probably put my pic 'Stealing Snow Shoulder Smooches' as the wallpaper again, since it helps inspire. It is still one of my very favorite pics for some reason.

Finally figured out how to use the new craptop A drive, which is supposed to be internal, as an external A drive - use the cable sent in the packet and pray. It worked fine.

This craptop has both the 'eraser' mouse I got used to with the old craptop and the 'touch' mouse. I am not happy with the eraser mouse's click buttons because they are really stiff and while the touch mouse's buttons are easy to click, using the touch mouse to navigate really gets my wrist hurting. So it looks like I will need to install the regular mouse to use this craptop, another wire hanging off while I am in bed typing... *sigh*

Loaded the two fics I want to complete soon, but I really need to load everything else this weekend. I never know when the muse wants me to work on something else so having everything available helps.

Worked on a pic I had abandoned back in January because of both the Japanese class and it wasn't coming out the way I wanted it to come out. Adding some hair to the back of S's head helped but his hand is too small and I did not realize it until I had worked on it for about an hour getting the fingers in a more natural position and completed all the shading on it. I am going to leave it since I am feeling too lazy to erase all that work and begin again, something I HAVE done before. This is not a great pic as it is, and rat keeps trying to get me to abandon it. I think I can save it to a degree with convincing shading and making 'dazzling' hair. And the light smut factor...

Have been ridiculously uncreative...

The energy I had for the new drawing just died, probably because of the dearth of responses from the last piece. Had to pull teeth to get some comments, which embarrassed me to have to badger people. Does the piece suck that badly?

I am still suspecting problems with the email, at least that's what my ego fairy keeps telling me. A few people have gotten back to me saying they sent response emails, but I never received them.

The other side of the coin tells me people don't like it since it is: 1) a change in style; 2) not naked men; 3) an image of a story they don't know; 4) something they just hate and they are too nice to tell me.

I am currently to the point I am getting pissed about it, but I will get over it soon. Probably does not help I found out I failed the Japanese class.

I need to stop the pity party and grab on to my muses again, but it is so hard to crawl out of the wallow at the moment.

I need to learn the new craptop since it is laid out a little different than the other, mouse-wise, figure out how the A drive works - whether I have to remove the DVD player and insert it to get it to work or can I use cables to hook it up externally -, get Word 97 installed, upload all the manuscripts, then get back to it.

I have made still more adjustments to one fic I am determined to complete this summer. Forgot I wanted to add some height info at one point later in the fic, which then changes some earlier descriptions I make about where a head would land when leaning into a taller person's body at the beginning of the fic. Ugh. Still haven't gotten the metrosexual razor section logged in either.

Hopefully these anal-retentive details will make the story come alive for people and they will appreciate all the hard work trying to make it right.

Off to grumble.

Thumbnails of what I have been up to lately with Aja/imayb1's blessing:

	the pencil sketch
	the inked piece - inspired by fel's inking!
	the final piece, with tones, patterns and gradients

You can read about the process and see the large version here:
http://www.ourwitzend.com/animeart_gravi/22-byograviart-daisies-shinObon/22-byograviart-daisies-so_main.html

This pic has been bouncing around in my brain ever since I first read the chapter, but I was not able to get it out at the time because of Japanese class. It is not exactly the scene I had in mind, but what the muse decided to give me.

Yay! The pic is looking good! Finished inking early Saturday afternoon and am currently in the final stages of finding a pattern to use as a fill for a yukata.

Then I think it will be done!

I will post the stages here when everything is completed.

I have sent a sketch to someone, hoping that person will like it even though it does not completely illustrate a scene from a particular story...

Well, I finished it...

I want to complete 'Afterglow', which will happen today if I am lucky. I have just a tiny section to blacken in, then I need to get the eyes and other main features a little darker and I think I will be done. then it is to the scanning bed so I can get rid of the paper impurities and the Italian food spatter. I have a tendency to work on art or writing during lunch at the office when not studying Japanese. All have suffered at one time or another.

And I have the next photo picked out for the new image I will begin soon.

I still need to get that story completed too.