Arashikage Fray

The newest G. I. Joe - Kre-O short I worked on is online this week. Most of the assets were carried over from the last project. I really wish I could have rerigged the Storm Shadow character for the drastic poses he needed. Using the old rig was a battle.




This short is suppose to mimic a Daffy Duck Robin Hood Short. Here's a snapshot of the original next to the Maya project.

This was also the first project I used motion blur with Maya, which ended up being fairly straightforward.

In other news: I moved into my new apartment/workspace last week which is a big improvement over the situation I had over the last year. I've been working on my CyberSnow piece in between setting things up. Might post an update if I get far enough anytime soon. Tomorrow I go back to working for Language Sprout doing illustration work though.

Life and Learning

Not much of an art post, but related.

The last couple of weeks have be Cray- Zeeee. And its taught me a couple things:

Patience with computers can be very hard but the more you learn about them the easier it gets.

Working in a place you find uncomfortable with a not so great landlord is very distracting.


More specifically my computer broke again. And at first it looked really bad which was terrifying as no computer makes it a bit hard for me to earn a living. It ended up being only that I lost my, FLUFFY, main hard drive (but hardly any work) and I have to get some memory replaced (again). The new hard drive is named Crookshanks. During and since then I've been putting a lot more effort into learning how my computer works and how to fix it myself so I don't have to waste time getting help diagnosing problems. It's been really difficult for me to comprehend but I am noticing that the more I know the faster my computer is out of commission when it does break down.

Also I signed my lease on my new place. No more basement and florescent lights in a month or so. It's closer to public transit as well, which means its easier to meet with clients. Gonna miss my roomies though.

This all means, that the bustle of moving is gonna keep me busy in the next month and half. And right in the middle of all of that, my little sister is coming to visit from Germany. I haven't seen her in almost two years! I've missed her so much. I'll be going to see her in Missouri and Illinois. But I will try to get some sketching in between all the car/bus time. (Really wish I didn't get motion sick)


In art news..

I'm just finishing up that Kreo project now, which I will post whenever I hear of it getting put online.

And work continues at Language Sprout. Just vocabulary illustrations right now. Nothing too exciting, but honestly I like the relaxation of its simpleness with all the other stress happening.

I have a fun little sketch from Independence Day I might post soon if I find the time to scan it.

Really wishing I had more time for some new video games and to work on my personal illustration I posted about last. Maybe the time will surface sometime in September.

SO MUCH TEXT. I'M DONE WRITING NOW.

CyberSnow

I've been working on this illustration on and off since like September. Took a break for several months actually, but started on it again recently.

It began as a figure study from a photo I found on deviantart.

Then I started trying a few different looks for a robot leg. I was super obsessed with game Transistor at the time... still am.

Started working on her skirt, and decided I wanted the challenge of adding a pattern to the petticoat.

I tried hand drawing the pattern but recently I thought of trying to model the frill in Maya and adding the pattern that way with a texture. It will also give me more options if I want to change it for a more difficult pattern. I've just started the modeling of it here.

In other news:

I got 4th in the design contest I posted about last time. Wooh!

And I'm working currently animating another Kreo Joe short, still pretty goofy, but a lot more fight action movement which is a newer challenge to deal with.

Please Vote! FanplusFriend Design Contest Submission

Hey I've entered a Lolita design contest for a nightwear. To vote for my submission, click on the link and like the photo of my design. Only like once in the contest please.

2015 Fanplusfriend 10th Design Contest:10FPF-B19
Posted by Fanplusfriend Garden on Thursday, 14 May 2015

 It may look rough but I spent a lot of my time researching and concepting. I didn't really have a lot of time either as I found out about it rather late. But it was a fun side project. Here are some of the rough concepts I discarded or redid along the way.

I like bows.

In other news:

I'm back to working on stuff for the language school now (although slowly on the count of everyone around me busy moving and doing finals).

Finished up a bunch of work with last month that was done on super rush using a program I learned during the process: Adobe Edge Animate. Edge is a bit glitchy and stiff to use compared to After Effects so I don't super look forward to using it again but it works with html so it might have some interesting new avenues of work for me.

And I'm working on another 3D printing project which is really really on the DL so I'm not sure when, if ever it will get anywhere but its a fun experience that hasn't taken a lot of time yet.

Book Making - Coptic Stitch

For the holiday season this year I made 10 hand made sketchbooks from 5 bought ones. Here, I've cut and folded signatures.

Here, I have a bigger workspace. I've separated the signatures into stacks for the books and am cutting the backs of the old sketchbooks into covers. I used book board too.

 My first finished one. I used waxed linen thread.

 More of them. The patterned ones are using fake sinew in different thicknesses I was experimenting with. And the white one is using thread leftovers to make a rainbow.

On the one I already claimed as my own, because of mistakes in the binding, I tried a caterpillar stitch. Next time I would make sure to have colored thread and not curve so harshly. Also this is terrible lighting.

Sketchbook Dump

Broke my keyboard so not much description right now. I finished filling my last sketchbook and these are some of the last doodles.

In other news: Did some concept work late last month that I will be posting about soon. Still finishing up Christmas presents (went way over board this year). Working on animation for work. Might do some water color for some illustration work the next couple of months.

3D Printing Experiments

I recently made friends with someone who built a 3D printer. In exchange for some modeling help, I got to have a couple things printed off. I'd never used stl files before and I had certainly never 3D printed anything before, only read about how it worked.

Here is a circuit board I modeled as a double to see how good of a scale replica I could make based on his measurements.

And here is a case for the circuit board we've started working on. It's pretty simple. Lots of changes need to be made to design still.

 And now for the more fun stuff. For part of my halloween costume I needed a light doornob to go on my costume. So I went ahead and modeled it and had that printed off aswell. We hadn't tried anything so angular before and only did one print without tweaking in between but I was pretty satisfied with how it turned out.

Here is the print in progress.

And hear is the printed doorknob.

Since my last blog post I've been busy with life stuff but I have finished a second book for print for my client that I will hopefully get to see in real form in the next couple months. I've been working on an illustration in my free time I'm hoping to finish. And I've started work on some animated shorts for my client that I hope to post in-progress stuff on later too.

Soon I'll be hand making some christmas gifts(as soon as the materials I need show up in the mail) which I will most likely post about next month.

So probably not many posts this month but hopefully more in January.