Blowing the dust off for two shakes

Yeah, so much for updating on a daily/weekly/monthly basis.  Between apartment hunting, moving, setting everything up, and playing video games (why hello there Red Dead Redemption, Alpha Protocol [stay away from that buggy PoS!], Yakuza 3, etc etc etc), drawing in general has been pretty low on my totem pole.  I have been doing at least a few studies per week, though, which I hope to get scanned in this week.

Since I have nothing to show, I'll dive into some quick video game reviews:

Red Dead Redemption: LOVE IT. It's a gorgeous game with a decent story and memorable characters (some of them make me so MAD I wish I could just kill them on the spot).  I like the combat, and I'm even doing okay on Expert :D  If you don't want to buy it, you should at least rent it.  It makes me like Westerns, and I normally am not a fan of those (to say the least).

Alpha Protocol: I WOULD HAVE loved it, except that it's buggy.  So buggy, in fact, that it froze my game in one particular spot about 15 to 20 hours in.  Couldn't get past the freezing at all, no matter what I did (I even set up a fan behind my Xbox 360 unit to keep it cooler).  RDR worked just fine, but Alpha Protocol came to a stuttering halt every time in those ruins in Rome.  It's a shame, too, because I actually liked it as a game.  The plot is decent, the characters are memorable, the combat is a less polished version of Mass Effect 2, with more of an RPG level up system, and the conversation system is a combo of Mass Effect 2 and Dragon Age, but TIMED.

Yakuza 3: not very far into it, but Kaz is a great uncle :D

Well, it's April

I know I've been slacking (at least in posting), but I've had a busy schedule lately.  And now I'm sick.  However, I'll be damned if I go without posting at least once a month.  I thought I'd post some drawings I've been working on in the past few weeks - I've probably used some sort of ref on pretty much everything (except the random faces in my moleskine).

So here goes (no particular order):

Anatomy studies, and a landscape

This is all I have for the last week - I just can't seem to get my head in the game, so to speak.  Something's better than nothing, though.  All of these were done in 20 to 30 minutes, using ref.

In video game news, I've been playing a ton of Final Fantasy XIII, and I'm loving it so far.  Mass Effect 2 is probably my personal Game of the Year, but still - having a blast for the most part.  I'm seriously considering canceling my WoW account till Cataclysm, and now I have friends telling me to join them on Star Trek Online or Champions Online, haha.  I'm considering it, at least till Star Wars: The Old Republic and Final Fantasy XIV come out...

Holy crap there's art in this post??

First off - I'm severely disappointed in White Knight Chronicles :/  It doesn't sit well with me when I'm playing a game, and all of a sudden I beat the final boss, and I didn't even know it was the final boss.  I literally sat there, staring at the screen, controller in hand, saying, "... this isn't the end, is it?  Is it? What the hell, I think I just beat the game!  WTF?"

So anyway, I'm playing Assassin's Creed on the PS3.  I have to say, I like the game a lot, even with the repetitive missions.  There's no way in Hell I'm going after all of those hidden flags, though.  That's a definite time sink, and this is coming from someone who has played World of Warcraft since release (except for a 9 month break, but I digress).  I can't wait to open up Assassin's Creed II, but that will have to be delayed till I finish ACI (and then Final Fantasy XIII comes out, so... yeah).

I promised art in the post title, so here goes - all are studies from the past two weeks (two of them are from today, actually).

This was from a study demo from Analytical Figure Drawing SP08 that I did on 02/17 during my lunch break.

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This was a shot at a quick environment, also done at work during a lunch break.  This was from a few days ago, I believe.

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Hey, look!  It's my stapler, my Gunnar glasses box case, and a box of Kleenex, all sitting at my cube at work!

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These are just anatomy studies I did today.  The torsos are from lunch today, and the lips and eyes and whatnot were done while watching Dave Rapoza's Monday Night Stream today (of course I missed it live, so I watched it after the fact on Livestream).

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Okay, I'm going to finish watching the Monday Night Stream, and head off to bed.

White Knight Chronicles - where was the beta testing?

I took a break from doing anything art-related last night, and instead spent a bunch of time playing White Knight Chronicles: International Edition (by Level 5 and Sony).

The game definitely has its flaws with the plot line, which makes me yell at the TV screen every hour or so for a good five to ten minutes per plot hole/cliche/super-fast exposition.  However, I usually just give it the MST3K treatment and move on.  I can accept bad and/or cheesy plotlines if the game play is good.  The voice acting is... uneven, but not cringe-inducing. Also, I love the random comments that are made by everyone when I'm running around a town/dungeon/battle/whatever.

The technical glitches that I've run into, however, make me want to cut someone.

Being limited by range when it comes to my attacks, but the enemy being able to hit me no matter where they are on the map?  Aggravating, but at least I knew about that one ahead of time, so I planned accordingly.

Having to run around and wait a few minutes to target an NPC to talk to them?  Time consuming, but not game breaking... unless it's an NPC in a timed quest.  Then panic starts to set in, and anywhere from 15 minutes to an hour of work can be shot to hell.

Having to run around and enter/exit game menus to try and get an NPC to become visible, as there's nothing except a floating nameplate in the air?  Not cool, especially if it's an NPC for the above-mentioned timed quest.

Having the controls lock up in the middle of a boss battle, where your only option is to hit the Triangle button to send a text to an online friend (if available and in-game), or R1 to defend?  Kind of game breaking for me. I couldn't even hit Select to try and change who I was controlling.  The only way to do anything was to RESET the game, and reload from my latest save.

Talking to an NPC and having their conversation text stop in the middle of a sentence (I made up an example to avoid spoilers: "Oh, hello, strange adventu")?  And they repeat that every single time you talk to them? I sure hope they don't have anything important to tell me, or I'm screwed.

Don't get me wrong - I like the combat a lot, when it's working (it reminds me of Final Fantasy XII, which I loved), the huge maps are gorgeous (and did I mention huge?), the character models are nice (if cartoony, and a little dated looking), and like I said - the plot doesn't bug me all that much (gives me fodder for mockage, if nothing else). 

Some of the glitches, though, make me want to just put the game down and never come back. Seeing as how I pre-ordered White Knight Chronicles, I'm pretty disappointed.  This game has been out for a while in Japan - why couldn't they tighten up the controls and the NPC appearance/disappearance issues, at least, before releasing it here?

First impressions of Sketchbook Pro 2010

I've been kicking around the idea of trying Sketchbook Pro 2010 for a while.  I even downloaded the trial for my Macbook, which I almost never use (except to play WoW at a friend's house every once in a while).  I was trying to use it on the Macbook, but with the small screen (13.3" or whatever vs my 19" desktop monitor) and my small Intuos3 tablet (lolwat), it felt clumsy to me.

Also, I didn't bother to read anything about how to use it.

In the end, I defaulted to CS3 on both machines.

Fast forward to now - I have a new tablet, dual monitors, and I'm still learning/re-learning how to use digital media again.  I'm looking for a program that I can sketch in, without having to mess with the brush settings in Photoshop (I'm sure it's not that hard, but I'm impatient, dammit!).  So I'm reading up, and lo, Sketchbook Pro 2010 crosses my path again!

It's roughly $100 USD, though, and I'm trying to tighten ye old money pouch again.  I figured I'd download the 15 day trial and see if it I like it enough - if so, I'd buy it when I get my next paycheck.

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Yeah, after messing with it for an hour, I'm ready to put the money down right now.

I didn't sketch anything freehand in it yet, just did a rough "ink" on a study I did at lunch today (I grabbed some dude's picture off the internet in between manual editing).  Here's the progression from scan to "finished product":

 

  

  

It's not the best thing EVER, but it was a lot easier to work in Sketchbook Pro 2010 than in Photoshop.  It runs light, it's easy to use (I had no problem setting up the straight edge tool!), I love the little tool lagoon... Yeah.

I'll try to use it for various things besides just "inking," just to make sure I still want to buy it at the end of the trial period, but so far I'm sold.

argh pt 2

OH HI CAPS

Anyway.

Here's take 2 for my Commander Shepard pic from a few days ago.  This was done after I spent over a half hour wondering why my new Wacom wasn't working properly (turns out it was because I had two installed on here.  Whoops).  I was finally able to work on this after uninstalling the old drivers, restarting, installed "critical updates," installed the new drivers, and restarted.  YES.

My digital ink skills are still rusty, so I just did ye olde "Multiply Layer!" method, with a bit of overlay.  Really, I just wanted to try out my new tablet.  I think I"ll try to push this a bit further, but we'll see.  I'd probably be better off making a nice clean pencil sketch and going from there, or starting with forms and values.

Right, so I guess it's time for bed?  It is 11:30pm right now, and my contacts are buggin' me something fierce.