This past month has just been insane. I'm finally poking my head out of the workload, and the end is in sight! We're getting ready for our end of the year exhibition and internships, which is super exciting!

Also spring weather: you can come out anytime now?? We had a random abnormal heatwave last week, let's just say I got to take out my flip flops out of the closet for a day or so - now I'm back to my winter coat and boots. :( waaahhh

I finally got to sit down and do a study, very speedy but HEY not my fault days only have 24 hours. I don't think I'll be able to go to life drawing for a little bit, so I'm totally going to kick myself into doing more studies on my own (I got lazy relying on it all the time!).

Approx. 2 hours

Study of woman with a quirky pose and a really long forehead. Also very detailed jewelry ahahaha

To finish off - I got tagged by Pauline @ Journal Illustrations and Musings to answer some questions! ;)

1. Favorite ice cream flavor?

Hmmmmmm. Cookie dough! 

2. Favorite book (or movie)?

Right now I'm really into the A Song of Ice and Fire book series. But Harry Potter will always have a special place in my heart. ;) Movies: pretty much anything classic Disney and... Mean Girls. hahaha

3. One thing that you love? (thing, not person) :-)

My laptop! C:

4. What makes you smile?

Many things! Funny cat videos, My Little Pony: Friendship is Magic, and coffee, to name a few.

5. Where was your best vacation?

I loved my trips to Florida and Paris, but they were dance trips - not really a vacation. ;) So I'm going to say my backyard.

6. What color is your car (if you have one) or your bike?

I don't have my own car, but I drive my mom's a lot. It's black!

7. If money was no object, what is the ONE thing you would do?

Travel!

8. Where do you feel most at home or ‘connected’ to the world?

... Probably at home! 

9. high heels or flip flops?

Flip flops all the way. I love heels, but I love being comfortable a lot more.

10. If you could change one thing about your life, what would it be?

Hmmm, I wish I were more assertive sometimes... 

11.What are you most proud of?

Ahhh what a question! Actually, I'm really proud of my mom for kicking her smoking habit. 5 months and she's still going strong. :)

Wowwww what a long post. Next one will hopefully have more art. 

It's March Break for me, yaaaay! Though it hasn't really felt that way at all... for one, I've been going to college anyway to work on my things so I don't fall behind, and life-wise things haven't exactly been going well! My mom got a cyst in her ankle removed a few weeks ago, and though there were no problems during the operation, her recovery has just been for the worst. Turns out her foot is super infected and she's been in and out of the hospital all week/hooked on a portable IV at home. :( Not exactly the best winter we've ever had, with her shoulder injury before Christmas (today was the 5th time I've had to drive her to the emergency room since fall) and our whole basement flood ordeal. BUT at least the weather hasn't been so bad?

On a lighter note, I officially have a spot at Animaritime 2012's Artist Alley again! C: The tables were all filled up in the span of a day, which is like, insane. TIME TO GET CRACKIN'

Life drawing this week went okay for me, not my best but not my worst either. We didn't do a lot of short poses, and the ones I do have didn't turn out that great. SO here's the longer stuff:

10 minutes - super classy pose!

10 minutes

20 minutes - creative pose ;)

Here's something I painted on a complete I'm-tired-of-working-on-my-resume whim earlier this week, but I'm really fond of it for some reason. Funny how that works...

Approx. 3 hours

Finally, I contacted VanArts today to find out when I could start applying for the Sept. 2013 session, since I'm planning to take care of that this summer. Apparently I can apply anytime and they've already accepted some people? ...I'm worried. 8| 

Life drawing this week (last week's was cancelled), I felt like it went really well for me (despite a few mishaps with the model), especially compared to last time I went where I felt like I just forgot how to draw or something ahaha ;_;

1 minute I believe

5s and 10s

Wish I could have finished this! Oh welllll

20 minutes - he moved a lot during this pose, the angle was very different at the end @w@

20 minutes - the color scheme on this reminds me of Rainbow Dash so bad

Another study, photo reference used of course! I'm trying to squeeze more of these in my schedule, not really aiming for perfect rendering just trying to get shapes and lighting down path. I think I will thoroughly study the crap out of everything this summer when I have more free time, though!

Finally HERE'S ME AS A PONY, I would be called Dreamtime and my cutie mark is a wacky clock over a moon because I'm so busy and I love sleep. And I would be a pegasus pony because of totally valid reasons not because I just like wings or anything. 

... and then I wonder why I'm still single

Smaller update today! I've decided to put original stuff and big paintings on the back burner for now, and focus on doing studies and prepping for the con. Gotta learn my stufffffff and improve!

Two studies I did this week:

A tiger! Animals totally elude me. So here we go. I'm kind of experimenting with new ways to paint and render, and different brushes and stuff. It's... supposed to be running but you can't really tell lololol

It looks nice if you squint I guess??

Also worked a lot on my Astrid cosplay this week! The shoulder armor is finally done :)

I'm sooooo proud of myself! I can actually be good at making things when it's for a hobby, it seems. 8D;

Stuff's been piling up, tiiiime to update!

My exciting news of the week: on Monday, my mom and I went home for lunch and found our basement almost completely flooded! Turns out a pipe from our hot water tank busted in the morning. :( All of the flooring, which my dad had just recently finished installing, was ruined. Our insurance is covering most of it though, and they hired a company to come and replace it for us, which is great. And thankfully we caught it early on, the water hadn't gotten to the corner with all the electronics yet, although there was some humidity. Could have been a lot worse, but it's still totally a buzzkill. :C

Onto more positive things! Went to life drawing this week--

30 seconds

5 minutes I think!

10 minutes? I thought switching color scheme for each set would make me remember the time more... I guess not hahaha

A few face studies

Some original stuff! I'm really into nordic/wilder designs lately, not sure why, probably all the Skyrim/A Song of Ice and Fire (reading book 3, totally amazing, ah ma gawd).

For a weekly art challenge on Tumblr: create a character of an ethnic group you're not used to drawing. So, I chose a native american! Decided to draw him in a modern setting, with some traditional elements incorporated. Very fun challenge, might render this some more eventually. C:

Working on a larger scale painting right now, gonna try to stick to it for once! also I am sooooo tired blah

Survived my first week back to my insane schedule! Also new this year: going for allergy shots once a week to finally get rid of those crazy hay fever symptoms I get every summer. I'm afraid of needles (though not as much as before), so hopefully this'll cure me in more ways than one. :)

Went to life drawing this week, I missed it soooo much.

Quick poses

I'm seriously going to commit myself to go every week I'm not working, I really need it!

A speedpaint to try out a new blending technique. When used in moderation, the smudge tool does wonders! I really like how this turned out, going to practice it some more because blending is always something I've had trouble with!

Off to work I gooooo~

Just a speedpaint I did a few days ago. (without a reference picture! which I almost always need when doing these! level upppp)

I'm going through a bit of a stressful time... hoping I can make it until Christmas, then I may need to drop a few things before it hacks away at my health too much. :s I've never had stress-related problems to this extent before, and for the first time in my life, drawing isn't making me feel better.

... on the plus side, I finally got to download Storytime by Nightwish, and I think I've listened to it over 50 times today. I don't want to spoil the rest of the album before I buy my copy, but January is so far away!!

Ok it's official - 24 hours is not enough hours in one day! I feel like I'm going nowhere with everything lately, starting a billion things but not finishing anything.

I didn't have time to update last week, so here's the stuff that's piled up!

Hands and feet, because they are the bane of my artistic existence.

More studies! I'm going to be doing a lot more of these. Also started sketching in colored pencils, it makes everything look prettier/stops me from erasing and spending hours on everything :U

Some more people... on the right, portrait practice with Arya and Eddard Stark from Game of Thrones!

OCs hurrrr nothing special, haven't been drawing them much lately!

The only digital thing I've been able to draw (and finish) this entire month, gonna start doing more of these speedpaints I think! P:

On another note, I'm still totally being owned by college. But I'm now SUPER excited for Nightwish's new album, which is coming out to North America in January (I wish it was closer to the European release or I could order it without a million bucks in shipping/international fees ;___; ). I wasn't completely sold on it before, but the teaser for the first single totally got me into it!

(mannnnnnn I feel like I'm 14 again being all giddy for Dark Passion Play)

Finally updating, after a few days of procrastination.  Days in which I finished reading Game of Thrones, started watching the HBO series, started the second book, got some more sunburns, watched old Disney movies, went to some dance workshops that were amazing but now I am in so much pain, and etc. I think my time was well-spent. ;)

Here are the only two sketches that came out decently during this week's life drawing, bleeeeh. But yay for weird angles!

 I've been working on my storyline a looooooot, and naming things... Nev's 11 siblings now all each have a name. 8D I... had way too much fun naming them all, seriously.

... and up there is one of her brothers, who is going to have somewhat of an important role. I totally blame is outfit on the fact that I was watching Hunchback of Notre-Dame as I was coming up with his character. C8<

.

First we have an old character of mine brought back to life, all shiny new with a new personality and everything. And then the result of me sketching while watching Game of Thrones, have a half-assed Daenerys. 8D

Some digital stuff~

I started reproducing a picture I took on my 30-hour long busride to Florida last year, but I never really got around to finishing it. ... I think this was in New York city? A part of it, anyway. XD

And a dam, because it came out of my head today. I like painting rocks. Trying out some new brushes/settings!

Did a lot of sketching over the weekend~ And I'm going to hope that my Internet doesn't go out while I am in the process of posting this, we're getting yet another rain-thunder-lightning show this evening.

First, some quick anatomies:

Then, I did the "Annoying poses" meme, which has been in my list of memes to do for a long time now and can be found here. I was too lazy to stick it in the template. :) And also felt like doing it with different OCs, instead of sticking to one. I AM SUCH A REBEL.

"Crawling on the ground searching for something" and "Explaining that something was very large".

"Flexing their muscles", "Yelling to someone far away" (which was supposed to be a bust, but, I felt like a full-body was in order) and "Impatiently waiting on someone".

And finally, "Reaching up high for something" and "Lifting something much too heavy". 

Sudden urge to use color pencils. 

... And here's Ve'yan again, well, a quick painting of his head anyway. Yes he does have an extraordinarily long nose. P: He's also now officially my only character with bodily markings! Oh how times have changed. But seriously, they're there for a reason and it makes sense, I promise.

My Animaritime commissions are officially now all taken care of-- the Link was claimed, the Zelda was claimed, and all the others were mailed as of today! Yay. :D