Managing my Expectations and Establishing Reasonable Goals

 It's been a while since I've written on this site, mostly because I've been busy with life and my own artistic projects.  A few month back I was working on making a hybrid novel for a story I was writing called Dragonfall. And in my own experimentation in writing and drawing I basically came to one main conclusion: Man I really suck at this!. Writing was hard, and drawing even more so, I'd let my artistic skills languish to the point my artistic skill had actually gotten worse than what is was a few years ago. 

It was bad, and I was getting real frustrated with myself for not taking my work more seriously and for a while I actually considered quitting all together. But I felt like I needed to have a few success in my life. I may never be able to do art as a career but I can at the very least say one day that my artwork is where i want it to be and I've told the stories I always wanted to tell.  

So what have I been doing all this time? 

Getting my shit together that's what. I've been putting in the time to practice and although its been difficult balancing a full time job and carving out time to practice my craft I have noticed some improvement even if its slower than I'd like. So for write now, Dragonfall is on the back-burner to be continued at a later time. On a related note, I've started another project although this one is mostly going to serve as a way to motivate myself to create again. 

 

some world-building not on alien writing tools

Union Station, is my little (although growing quickly) world-building project that I created with the specific goal of getting myself to draw regularly again. Its a scifi world in the same vein as star trek or mass effect but with a relatively hard science foundation. (all of the aliens in this setting are non-humanoid and there's no space magic. I'm looking at you biotics!) I think its a good project to work on as it requires me to draw a lot of things I normally wouldn't such as machines and vehicles. So far it seems to be working as I can confidently say, I can sorta draw robots! now so yay for me! :>. Of course this does mean I should go back and revisit some old character designs I made years ago.

I also haven't entirely given up on comics yet

 Time is limited, and i often find my attention divided. I used to draw comics years ago but i definitely bit of more than I could chew. This time around i want to make lots of little stories, and shorts (4-10pg) to get back into the process. I've got a short comic I'm working on called, I'm calling it The Pact, its about a robot on an important mission. 

work in progress from my short comic

Oh and one last thing!

 I've working on making a personal website on neocities. It won't be very big, as I want it to act as a link between my other social media sites and my various webcomics and artistic comics. Currently learning html and css, wish me luck!.

 

 

Character Concepts

 In not really a story if there aren't any characters. So far I have a few ideas. 

Saffi & Partisan 

The two main character whose backstories I sorta have fleshed out. 

Saffi, the totally not an elf and Partisan the Golem

Saffi Wade

Young Adult, Human

Saffi is a young practioner who wishes to one day to become a well a magi. Essentially a wizard. She was rescued by a dragon slayer and his golem from a dragon when she was a child and the event left quite the lasting impression. Ever since she wasted to a magi and create golems and construct which can help people. However she is unfortunately, very poor but she's also very stubborn. A chance encounter with a broken silver golem (Partisan) within a dragon lair finally gives Saffi the break she was looking for. With a golem on her side she manages to slay the dragon, acquire enough gold to relocate to Harckumchor, City of Embers where she can train at a Magi academy. Although lacking a formal foundation in magic, Saffi is creative, smart and determined but incredibly stubborn and at times self-centered.

Partisan

Silver Golem, Age ??? at least 50

Partisan is a unique golem, Made by an automated forge which created the first truly autonomous golems. Saffi found Partisan in a pile of refuse within a dragons lair. She managed to partially repair him to somewhat working condition. In the beginning of the story he doesn't really have much of a personality but later develops one. He's surprising patient, a very dry sense of humor, and is loyal to a fault. As with most constructs he finds most humans to be confusing. He's really the muscle of the story and is Saffi's close friend and protector. 

An Experiment in Hybrid Novels

 So I've been thinking of shifting my initial idea for a web comic into something that's a bit more like a hybrid graphic novel. I don't think it'll make making this story particularly easier but I am hoping that at the very least more likely to actually finish it. So while I work on drafting and concepting my story I've been looking for an example that can act as my basis for this hybrid novel. 

Cassandra Darke by Posi Simmons

This is sort of a hybrid novel that leans a little more towards the comic side. I've yet to read the story yet, I've mostly been looking for examples and came across this after someone mentioned it on reddit, (I really should read it though it looks interesting) and here there's blocks of text  written along side illustrations. From what I tell the story is written in a more personal anecdote or biography which I think matches well with the text. It does feel in many was like a flashback or a memory like your seeing the images appear directly on the page as the words are spoken, but in a more literal sense. 

Then there is of course Zathura, which has a more picture-book  sort of style to it where the text is written in shorter blurbs alongside full page or even partial page illustrations. I particularly like this options as well as i think their are some fairly interesting things you can do with this style as well. Perhaps the text on the page can mingle into the words. 

Other books introduce the occasional picture or illustration interspersed throughout the chapter. Some even have illustrations for a chapters title card. Something I'm kind of keeping in mind at the moment will mostly be how common the illustrations will be within a story. I want a happy medium somewhere between a picture book and a more traditional novel. Either way I am considering paneling the story as as well, maybe not as detailed as a I normally would for a comic, text will come first however during the editing process I'll definitely edit it to better incorporate the illustrations. 

This does of course leave me with another question, where to publish it? 

Well for one, there really isn't a website that's dedicated to something like this. So i think the best option ironically enough would be to treat it more like a web-comic that has considerable amount of text than normal and i think to take the full advantage of the format. I've looked into sites like Royal Road and Wattpad and while they do both allow for the inclusion of illustrations i feel like with their more web based approached (i.e narrow column for scrolling for phones) would present a lot of challenges. The full-page spread for one wouldn't be an option that for sure. 

Alternatively, i can have the story posted twice, one form in full text and the other in its more natural state on a web comic site (comic fury maybe?) It certainly worth a try. 

A Continuation on Spell-Writing

 Continuation of Spell writing

A Basic Rundown

Decided to further expand on the writing system I made earlier for the Laws of Magic. It mostly so I can draw spells with a little bit of consistent meaning to them. Really though I doubt the actually story itself with explore then too extensively. Although individual sigils might grow to be of some import later. 

WIP, of a the current list of sigils that appear throughout the story. Their are spaces to incase I need to add more. 

The most basic component of a spell is the sigil. Sigils are reoccurring symbols which can be found throughout nature. Sigils can be combined to produces words or phrases and when surrounded by a circle produces a glyph a spell component. 

Sigils are grouped into three categories: Elemental, Control, Modal, and Declarative Markers

Elemental sigils which are currently known are the foundry elements, Earth, Water, Fire, Air and Aether which make up 'things' or materials. 

Control sigils, are sigils will tell the magic, what it should do. So as an example: The union glyph states to join or merge two things physically.

Modals: Are sigil which state a glyphs intent and further define how a spell is to resolve a certain effect. (Example: The possible sigil is used frequently to denote a glyph as a placeholder to represent an unknown sigil) 

Declarative Markers: These are sigils which act as descriptors and are used to further define a spells meaning. Think of them as adjectives or adverbs 

A sigil representing a Runestone, literal translation

"Target this glyph which possibly means runestone

Further Rules about spell construction

• Spells are written step by step
• A complete spell phrase is held within a circle. 
• Some glyphs can have a secondary boundary typically a triangle or a square which signify the order a spells components should be read. Circles have the highest priority and are always read first and at the same time. 
• When a smaller glpyh is nested in another glyph it tells the spell to treat a non-declarative marker as a declarative marker. 

A drawing i made for a fire spell, commonly used as a Firestarter for stoves, torches, and for campsites. 

If you have keen eye you can spot the individual sigils which make up the two major glyphs. 

Translation

Top Glyph: Target (Refer to this glyph) which possibly means runestone

Bottom Glyph: Conjure from the targeted glyph 

There's multiple different ways to write this spell depending on how its casted. In this case, this spell is meant to be casted using a runestone (a magic rock that holds power, more on this at a later time) hence the need for the target symbol. 

Magic Systems: For The Laws of Magic

The Laws of Magic (TLM), was an old incomplete comic i wrote in 2014. Its been sitting on my mind for a while and after ten years I've decided to return to the story and potentially complete it. As such I've been reworking the setting from the ground up. TLM deals quite a bit with the nature of magic, it's a high magic setting where magic is akin to technology anyone can use it and anyone can learn it, but it does take practice and knowledge to be truly be proficient in it.

Magic spells are written and I wanted spells to have a distinct and unique look to them, and I also wanted them to be easily read/understandable to the reader with a keen eye. After a little bit of research I came across Veve which are a collection of religious symbols used to represent deities in Voodoo, so I decided to take a bit of inspiration from that as i didn't want to draw from alchemy ( I wanted something unique).

Veve of Ogoun, from wikipedia https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Veve

My current list of sigils and their meanings

As of right now I don't have a complete list of all the magic symbols that will appear throughout the story yet. But i did leave spaces in the grid to add to it when the time comes.

A concept of a glyph comprised of multiple simpler magic symbols. this one represents a type of magic stone, a Runestone

The main design principle behind how spells look is that casting magic is a bit like speaking a language and coding a program. The symbols have meanings and can be combined together to produce words or phrases which have innate power to them.

Yet Another Year: Fleshing out a Story I wrote years ago

 Yet another year, and as of recently I've been interested in rebuilding and redeveloping an old story I wrote years ago back when i was in college. I've always wanted to write a comic, but with my current busy life as a fulltime adult, comics are unfortunately a time sink i don't really have the time to invest in anymore. I still enjoy the creative process but above all else, I want to get my stories out there, to at least say hey i made something. Now I'm not entirely sure what medium the current version of this story is going to take, but i think it'll be something along the lines of a light novel, a written story with lost of illustrations. 

The Laws of Magic, a comic I wrote, sometime in 2014 i think. I've long since lost the original files but its still posted on comic fury:  https://comicfury.com/read/LOM/comics/504703

I think over the years I've improved on the writing process. At the start of this comic, i didn't really have a good idea of where i wanted to take the story. So i sort of wrote the story at the same time I drew it and frankly i hit a block and couldn't figure out how to progress the narrative in a meaningful way, but it did teach me a lot about drawing at least. 

Dragon Rider

 

Dragon Rider 

Old Drawing in sepia tone of a girl riding a dragon

Sterling City: Web Novel Project

Sterling City (Working name) is a story idea I've had for a while now. Its been living sort of rent free in my head for honestly the past few years and has been mostly a project I've been working on partially for fun. I've debated back and forth as to weather I wanted to make a comic or a more traditional novel and I've come to the conclusion to do some what of a combination of both. Something in the vein of dinotopia lots of illustration to accompany written text. 

So what is the Sterling City About Anyway? 

Well it ironically start life out as a fanfiction idea, which I then decided to make its own separate setting. Now I'll never tell you what that fanfic was originally suppose to be (I never wrote it) but for my own sanity I'll never tell you what fandom it was for. Like ever. I'm taking it to my grave! But the general gist of the setting was, a sort of machine uprising but in reverse. An organic race created by a bunch of robots who eventually begin to rebel against their makers (and yes the robots made them Jurassic park style). I consider this to be more of a setting as a place to tell stories at this point but at the moment I'm still trying to develop and built the setting. There's still a lot I want to change so here's some old art. 

Solar System

I took some inspiration from the Dark Crystal, as none of the characters in this world are human. The Fulcra-Strata system is a binary star system with six primary planets. The majority of the setting takes place on Xitron-g (Xitron-gamma) a planet similar to earth and is the only one that has a map at the moment. Of course this isn't exactly meant to be a setting that focuses heavily on realism but it is largely a sci-fi setting similar to say mass-effect or star trek.

Map of Xitron-Gamma

An old map of Gamma, due for a major overhaul. I drew this years ago and so much has changed from my initial inception. Gamma was colonized by the machine inhabitants of Xitron (totally not inspired by cybertron) and as such I wan't to give everything a very machine-ish name. Some things i plan to keep the same such as the major cities but everything else is bound to change. 

Early Concept art/drawings

This one is the remains of a steel giant. An ancient alien machine ancestor which were created by a long extinct alien race. While there are no living members in modern times, their influence on the world is still felt nearly a million years after. 

A Mermaid in a Tank

An early idea of a group of people on this world. A mermaid created and kept purely for display. 

Projects and among many other things

Starting Twitch Again

Been thinking about starting streaming again on twitch. It's been a while and it could be a good way to work on finishing games, that i haven't really gotten around to completing. At the moment, I'm working on a few banners and artwork which i can use during streams. Still haven't worked on the music situation but I'll figure that out when the time arises. 

Twine Games: Goblin Quest 

So as a side project, I've been slowly working on an adventure game in twine called Goblin Quest. Its a game where you are a goblin exploring a mysterious cave looking for treasure. Its going to be one of those, high mortality games where death sits around every corner. Lots of ridiculous scenarios, and hopefully lots of art. I'm going to have to learn CSS, so I'll have to keep that in mind. 

A Slow Work in Progress Painting

 I've been working on this piece of the past few weeks. One of my goals for 2023, is to make more complete pieces. I do a lot of sketching but not a whole lot of actual illustrations and well i sorta want to change that.  

Multimedia - Gouache, Color Pencil, Watercolor, a inks.

Aliens Concepts: The Kral'jeveski

 Returning to some prior story ideas that's been sitting on my mind for a while. The Sterling City was and still is a work in-progress story/comic idea which I haven't gotten around to actually working on in any real meaningful manor and as a result a lot of it has changed quite a bit over time. But, I'm not exactly in any rush. As for the basic concept idea, well it was sort of born out of a fanfic idea (for overwatch no less ha!) which ended up gaining its own identity 

Some where far away in another place and time, is a star system home to a race a sapient machines, ones who history is long and mostly forgotten. They mashina (working name) colonized many different planet in the solar system and some few thousands of years ago, they resurrected an extinct race of intellegent monotremes called the Zoas who they've relegated to the role of pet/servant/pest. Kinda dark, but the story itself is mostly about the Zoas and there overall struggles living in a world that doesn't really respect them and wasn't really built for them. Its still a story idea thats a work in progress. 

I wanted to come up with a few ideas, for what the mashina, might have looked like in ancient times. They used to be an organic alien race known as the Kral'jeveski (the "J" is pronounced like "h" just like in Spanish) The Kral, lived on a world orbiting a dying sun, they lacked the technology to leave their planet and so instead they made AI copies of themselves and sent that the copies into space which were later found by an incredibly advanced race of aliens known as the Po who would later help to turn the copies into the precursors of modern machines. There a bit more to it but that's the general gist. 

Anyway, what they look like is still something I'm working on but i like the idea that they were hexapodal avian of some sort.