*pack pack pack*

I finally snapped and went looking for a venue I could customize more easily. To that end:

Here.

Things that are here will stay here for now, but new artsy crap is going over there.

Curios and Trinkets, part the fourteenth

In which Chala resorts to actually stringing some beads to slow down the rate at which she burns through chain (although there's a lot of chain in this entry, too). There is also a lot of her swearing at an uncooperative camera, but we'll gloss over that bit.

Onyx, candy jade, pumice, and crab agate.

Mother of pearl and jasper.

Lots and lots of moss agate.

Quartz and crab agate.

Hematite and watery aqua glass with a faint coppery sheen. Camera butchery ahoy.

Glass.

Agate and adventurine. Kind of tempted to remove the branch sections 'cause they like to flip over.

Jasper and serpentine.

Turquoise. Easily the most awkward word to type in the English language.

Quartz, rose quartz, and lepidolite.

Screwing around with wire. Stone unknown.

Agate.

Glass.

Crab agate.

Serpentine. New picture, old pieces.

Agate. Really irritating to untangle.

And something made with no intention of letting anyone else have it, ever.

I Have More Time Than Good Sense

Rather than get anything useful done today, I ended up dicking around with the WoW Model Viewer.

With my sincerest apologies to xkcd:

And this can only be explained with "the people I play WoW with are all insane". It's a long story.

To Hell and (most of the way) Back

Spent entirely too much time working on a visual timeline of the blood elf version of Ms. Kos:

(A properly large version is here.)

1. Wee sproglet. Yes, she was originally brunette.

2. Sprog. Not exactly appropriately dressed for a future noblewoman, but see if she gives a toss.

3. Disgruntled adolescent (is there another kind?).

4. Majoring in Evocation with minors in Alchemy and Transmutation. Also probably breaking the U of Dal dress code like it's going out of style.

5. Bored with roasting trolls in her backyard; decided to kick some orcish ass in the Second War.

6. Following the Third War, has completely lost her shit.

7. Went back to studying the Art properly instead of screwing around with warlock crap. Being talked to by the saronite in the walls of Icecrown Citadel. Holding a trinket from a friend and attempting to not completely lose her shit again.

8. Yeah, she feels a little better now.

Still Water and Abject Terror

Some sketches done in between bouts of tossing B into pits of toxic waste in Portal 2.

B's mage and Ismial being cute.

Even sorceresses that waste legions of humans for kicks have to start somewhere.

...even if they do end up freaking out from time to time.

Sharkbait

My love of near-complimentary colours outweighs my unreliable sense of empathy.

I do find her expression to be equally relaxing and unsettling, though. No air bubbles, because she's breathing water rather than holding her breath.

Unnatural History

As chance would have it, I found myself doing a spot of character creation the other day. A story-telling sort of chap, and the equivalent of a walking history book.

Didn't much like his clothes here; made him look too monkish with the staff factored in.

Fur lining, armwarmers, and sepia make everything better.

And for kicks, here's a commission from last week. Painting greyish skin without it looking sickly is tricksy.

Don't call me Ishmael.

(Because if I had a gold piece for every time someone misread or mispronounced Ismial's name...)

Rebooting the Dragon, part the third

More prodding at Mikala...

...and a little something drawn to relax after beating my head against the above painting for hours at a space.

I finally found the Lab colour slider in Photoshop, and used it for some of the background. It may be the beginning of a beautiful friendship.

Rebooting the Dragon, part the second

This painting is turning out to be a touch out of character for Mikala, since there isn't actually any artifice in his expression at all.

And for kicks, his sister being obnoxious. And Faenori's brother. I'm making this into lineart, but not liking the results thus far.

And a tiefling. Because I can.

Holiday Vitriol

I hate this holiday. Binge drinking and the celebration of someone credited with kicking an existing religion out to make more room for his own. Two shitty things that apparently go together wonderfully.

Clearly, Amelia the snake isn't too keen on the literalist interpretations of certain aspects of it, either.

My life as an Ion cannon

Yes, I know. It's four in the morning and cleverness is most assuredly not my strong suit at this point.

I also first typed that as 'string suit', which really doesn't sound the slightest bit comfortable. But whatever; a wild Brystion appears!

And just because I liked the original sketch best...

God, I hate warlocks...

Actually, I don't--I have one, that being Ismial's sister--but my main in WoW is a mage, so one must keep up appearances, yes? You know how it is; you're strolling along, discussing Thalassian politics with a colleague, and all of a sudden some smartass warlock's pet demon is chewing on you.

Something for two friends. The felhunter gnawing on Anasyan's robe is by far my favourite part. Who knew something with no eyes could look so freaking happy?

Oh, and seriously? Don't ask about the dead fish. I don't want to know either.

Rebooting the Dragon

Pecking away at the drawing of Mikala. Still needs backlighting and some shading on the background, but the underpainting is almost done. If not for Myn's timely suggestion of a night sky background for the windows, I'd likely still be beating my head against backlighting him with a snowy daytime sky and swearing a lot.

 

It looks as though his fate has taken a turn for the less crunchy in Tea and Sorcery, primarily because I was more than a little put out at how much wasted potential the original setup involved. He and Lady Kos managed to form an odd rapport that dealt with their respective grievances quite nicely--roughly 20 hours before they were both slated to die. I ended up changing that--not because I dislike killing characters, but because I would have been right pissed to see a character given a new lease on life and never having the opportunity to use it. Ironic, but wholly unsatisfying.

I did still break quite a few of his bones, though, simply because I'm an ass.

Curios and Trinkets, part the thirteenth

Spring is a good way off, yet, so I finally snapped and set up the camera indoors to take care of the jewelery backlog. I think that when I finally go back to using the logs in the backyard, I'm going to have to find some way of getting the camera closer to the surface as I did this time. The little details actually show in this batch. Brace yourselves for spam!

Copper and Czech glass. The chain for this particular one was done by a neophyte smith from Gimli (and at the time I purchased it, had been housing a Mjollnir that I wanted to put on a leather cord and send to B for his birthday).

Gunmetal, adventurine, candy jade, and some silverplated brass.

Brass and glass.

Another attempt at catching a character in a necklace. This one was Ismial, the priest that gets all misty-eyed at the thought of messing with complex machinery. Brass and some sort of agate.

Copperplated brass. And springs!

There was at least one mortal maiden out there who was into taming unicorns for the ivory, rather than any interest in the whole magical pony thing. Brass, mystery stone, and some Sculpey.

Gunmetal and some smoky blue-brown mother of pearl beads.

Silverplated brass and some vitrail Swarovskis. They barf rainbows.

Silverplated brass and candy jade.

Silverplated brass and matte crab agate.

You have no idea how tired I am of typing 'silverplated brass'. Also dyed quartz.

Brass and dyed imperial jasper.

Shrinky Dinks, fossil stone, and silverpl--ARGH!

Brass and moss agate.

Brass and a crapload of crab agate.

Glass and dear god I don't want to say it again.

Copperplated brass, candy jade, and crab agate.

Gunmetal and glass. I've had that pendant for well over a decade; the fact that it was billed as a Sidhe knot made it utterly irresistible to me.

A stardial, which Astreja got me for Christmas (I suspect Ms. Kos was using me as a proxy when I requested it). I recently got around to taking it off the silk cord it came on and putting it on something more fitting.

Brass and crab agate.

Brass and crab agate. Again!

And lastly... brass, dyed imperial jasper, serpentine, and a wee bitty bottle.