It’s about time, I believe, for a sketchpost! This is an extra-large one. It’s got some of the usual stuff from the last sketchbook, but also some digital things I just did to test out my new tablet.

Last sketchpost included some good news for people who like the Robo-Beatles; this time around it’s good news for people who like the Beat boys. After something like four years of watching these characters kick ideas around my brain, building an enormous setting around them, and writing a succession of less-than-successful stories about them, I have finally figured out what I am trying to do with their project. I wrote a purpose statement the other evening to keep me on track, and this makes me hopeful that come graduation I can actually start DOING SOMETHING with this thing. And maybe not self-indulgent unpublishable somethings, either.

In a few days I’ll probably start poking at thesis, as well as some real-world art obligations and general back-to-school prep, because school fires back up in a couple of weeks! Exciting and a little bit scary. If I can make it through the next twenty weeks or so there is every chance that I will have a real honest-to-goodness degree. I’ve got a long list of post-graduation to-dos as far as art, writing, and blogging are concerned.

(posted this in devART a few days ago)

I drew this at the behest of a family member. I’ve introduced my family to the Animal Game, where I grab three people (two is acceptable, four gets complicated; three usually nets maximum hilarity), cry “PICK AN ANIMAL” and draw a mashup of whatever they suggest. The family member in question came up with this combination all on his lonesome, but it was so great I could not refuse.

Attempts to figure out one of the few nonhuman cultures in the Matriarchies setting. These are the Hypriot (sg. hypriol). They’re sort of monotreme-like. The spots on their faces are actually–I think–some sort of sensory organs, but I’m not sure what exactly they do.

Monsters! I fooled around with some lighting ideas when I was grayscaling these. Some worked better than others. The guy with the fez was one of those moments when you see something (a tie pattern, in this case) and at first glance it looks EXACTLY like a dino in a fez (or whatever); you look again and you realize you were wrong, but your first idea was so amazing you’re sad that it wasn’t reality.

And yes, the “proper” color for the Mustachebeast is blue.

Thoughts in drawing form about Theo and Sieran in Menagerie. It’s a challenge, not making Menagerie Sieran look too much like Saul (or at least like a relation). Especially since, unlike most Sierans I draw, he doesn’t have longer hair. I suppose he could, but it’s a particular kind of statement in British-Gallic society (hence Simon’s long hair his freshman year at an expensive and prestigious university, where a lot of the young men grow their hair) and not one I think this Sieran would want to make. Admittedly the bowl cut is also a statement, albeit a different one whose significance is not quite so clear.

I’m not sure that Theo is (intentionally) making any statement with his hair, except “I hated getting my head shaved when I became a mime.”

Speaking of which. Sometimes I wonder what his clown persona would have been, if he’d made it to the end of his novitiate.

Some more tablet practice, a doodle of Saul. I don’t know that it’s immediately obvious in the results, but this new tablet has a LOT better pressure sensitivity than my old one, and I feel like I have much better control over the lines. Also, I’ve been using self-scanned paper textures a lot and I think I like them.

The most recent tablet practice doodle I’ve done, a portrait of Mike. This is the biggest new thing with the new tablet–I never had much success with lineless styles before, probably due to the lack of line control. Experimenting in one thing often leads to experimenting in another, so I messed around here with non-realistic coloring. I’ve been very into blue these days, for some reason, and yellow of course goes nicely.