Thursday, April 19, 2012

Book Proposal

Working Title: Hyaku Monogatari

Premise: The first chapter of a story involving all kinds of fiendish Japanese yokai, and the two friends who try to help one another understand their places in the human world. The first chapter will include how the two main characters, Katsu and Kuroshiro meet, and set up the boundaries of their relationship as they both set out to Osaka.

Specs: I'm going to traditionally ink the pages, but if time allows I do want to try and add at least a few tones in photoshop. The pages will be 8.5"x11" and approximately 22 pages long. Finishing touches will be done in photoshop, including text and bubbles.

Timeline: As of 04/19/12 I've completed the script as well as the thumbnails for all 22 pages. In order to complete the pages by the deadline, I'm going to try to pump out 4-5 a week...which may be suicide, but we'll see...

Influences:

Natsum Yuujinchou


Okama- Hanafuda


Okami



Wednesday, April 18, 2012

Katsu and Kuro



Katsu

Race: Yokai (rabbit)
Job: Messenger
Age: 22

Katsu is meek, gentle and easily startled. He is one of the fastest couriers in the land, and he takes great pride in his work. However, he can sometimes put his pride first and becomes impatient easily.

Kuroshiro

Race: Yokai/Human (ookami)
Job: None
Age: 18

Kuroshiro's mother was raped by a hunter, thus she was born a human-yokai hybrid. Both her mother and older sister, Asuka, despise her because of this. She is exiled from the wolf tribe shortly after turning 18 because she is deemed old enough to take care of herself. Despite her rough upbringing, she is a sweet, happy individual who wants nothing more than to find her place in the world.

51/100 Character Drawings

Honestly, half of these were kinda a waste of time because only 3 of these characters will be making an appearance in the 22 pages I'm illustrating...still, I had a fun time drawing other characters to populate the world they're in. I also have no idea if these actually tally up to 100, but...it's still a lot, right?


Wednesday, March 14, 2012

Some ink stuff

Hey, kids, it's been a while. I mostly post on my Tumblr and my game concept blog now, but I figured I should be active here for the extremely few people who view this. Have some inked things I've done at varying points in my life.

Because the couple that Skyrims together stays together. Vday 2012


Something I wanted to finish for Xmas 2010. Bad scan.


Ink doodle done in Summer 2011

Monday, April 19, 2010

Hierophants concepts and world

Nu-Khemite: Egypt in the year 3212. Life is filled with toil and social unrest. Those on the lowest social rung live in the slums on the outskirts of the city and are slaves for those higher up. The merchant and guildsmen classes thrive in the inner city. The cities, three distinct districts, nestle the Nile which has since reformed as a giant pool, in the center of which stands the gargantuan Obelisk. Those of great social standing live above the cities in three giant, floating pyramids. Only those of the most powerful standing and whom control Nu-Khemite reside in the Obelisk.

The Sky Pyramids: Three colossal pyramids that orbit the Obelisk. Each pyramid controls a correlating city below for the time it hovers above it (4 months at a time). Only the rich and powerful may live in the pyramids, and each pyramid ascends by rank as well. The Pyramid of Earth contains wealthy merchants and rich socialites, The Pyramid of the Sky houses politicians and The Pyramid of the Sun houses royalty.

The Obelisk: The central power corporation of Nu-Khemite. This is the power source of the country and everyone must obey its order. No one is certain of who runs it, but its power is never objected. The technology that grants the Khemites the ability to live in the desert comes directly from the inner workings of the Obelisk. Also, the genetic splicing and research that created the Demites is carried out within its confines.

Demites: Spliced beings composed of human genes and the blood of ancient deities. The demites are half-man, half-beast. There are two grades of demites: Demite, which is a creature with the head of a God and the body of a man, and Demetian, anthromorphized God beasts. Demetians are flukes in the Demite process and are therefore regarded as inferior by true Demites. Demites may reside in the pyramids, and are revered by many, but they cannot breed and must turn to the Obelisk in order to procreate. Demetians, soiled by man, live in the lower cities and have the capacity to breed (albeit it is difficult and there are many unsavory incidents with Demetian spawn).

The Hierophants: A group of revolutionaries whose goal is to topple Obelisk and regain control from the sky pyramids. They oppose Obelisk's dictatorship and the oppressive nature of the Sky Pyramids. They fight for the poor and abused and seek to cure the social injustice. They are led by two young girls, Hage and Udjat.

The Embalmers: A rival group of extremists and terrorists. They are known somewhat as an urban-legend, though the inner circles of the Pyramids fear mention of them regardless. Their goal is to usurp power from the mighty, though their reasons for doing so are unknown. They are led by Mael and Soso.

Artifacts: Ancient artifacts that still hold some power that was bestowed upon them by the Gods. Originally the artifacts were controlled by the Obelisk, but in a previous generation and unsuccessful revolution a few artifacts were stolen from Obelisk and lost again to the sands. It is rumored that they had been modified by Obelisk so that even man could wield the power of the Gods.

Comics: Finals idea

So I think I'll be revisiting the sci-fi Egypt story from last term.... Here's some stuff to lay it all out:

A misfit group of guerrillas struggle to overtake the oppressive Obelisk Corporation that controls nearly all of future-Egypt in a dystopian sci-fi thriller.

The Hierophants is the story of two young rebel leaders fighting for survival in a desert world run by the Obelisk Corp. Also vying for Obelisk's destruction is a rival guerrilla group, the Embalmers, who have more sinister goals. These two groups inhabit a searing world filled with slaves, royalty and even the Gods. One group battles for the poor, the other for ultimate power, but only one can control the Obelisk.

I want to do an 8-pg intro for this in full color, so I've gotta get cracking. I need some solid thumbs because I won't have much time to tweak page design and I don't want to spill over the allotted 8 pages. I also need to do some research into settings since I have no idea how sci-fi I want to take this.

I'm Kind've thinking of making the metropolitan areas of the cities themselves like Rabanastre from FF12 or like Agrahbah from Aladdin, but we'll see. I need to get some vehicle thumbs done though since I doubt future Egyptians travel via camel back or chariot.

Tentative timeline:

April 19: Get all main facets of story in place and defined ie: descriptions of everything.
April 21: Finish thumbs and design sketches
April 26: Have all pages sketched
April 30: At least 2 pages inked
May 18: All pages and cover inked
Final day: All pages colored and printed/stapled as a final copy

Tuesday, April 13, 2010

boing...



Ok, this is mildly ridiculous.. I've been trying for 2 1/2 straight hours to get playblast to correctly save this as a functioning .avi, but to no avail. I had to resort to using a screen recording program which made this absurdly choppy, so sorry for the low quality. It may not be a very long animation, but I assure you it's much more fluid than what's presented in the above video.