Gods and mortals

As always life's been a bit too busy to post over here.  If you're following me on Tumblr you've already seen all of these, but I like to spread out my stuff. 

Aphrodite, Cupid's mother and the villain of our story.  She's not entirely bad, as she does love her son and most of her actions towards Psyche (or some of them at any rate) are done in the belief that she is not good enough for him.  She's sort of the mother-in-law from hell.

Ares, god of war and possibly Cupid's biological father.  I haven 't fully decided on that.  He's an act first think second kind of guy, with a quick, pretty explosive temper.  However when he's in a good mood, he's a pretty good guy.

Persephone's mom.  We probably won't see her except in passing.  I had to crop her role out as it slowed down the story and I just wanted to get to the confrontation between Psyche and Aphrodite at Aphrodite's temple.

Psyche's oldest sister.  Psyche's sister's are described as being unattractive.  I liked the idea that they were alright looking girls who overcompensated with clothes, jewelry, and make up where Psyche was simple.  Charis is a Greek name meaning "grace, kindness" which aren't necessarily traits I'd ascribe to her.  She's the more hot headed of the three sisters.

Psyche's next oldest sister.  Costume wise I decided to have the main colors of Charis and Melitta's clothes fall to either side of Psyche's on the color spectrum.  Melitta generally has a cooler head than Charis.  Melitta is an ancient Greek version of the name, Melissa, which means "bee" and Melitta likes to think of herself as and tries to be the queen bee of the group.

I'm off to London later this week, so I'll try to post again when I get back.  I'm participating in Inktober over on my Instagram, so I'll try and cross-post some of my stuff over here then as well.

More greek gods and goddesses

Over the last month, I've been busy working on getting more of the cast of Cupid and Psyche fleshed out.  I'm probably half-way through the Greek pantheon right now.  Most of the gods and goddesses are more of back ground characters, but its fun coming up with designs for them.

I loved the idea of having Athena be a woman of color.  The Athena that lives in my head is basically voiced by Gina Torres and is pretty much Zoe from "Firefly" so it wasn't that much of a stretch.   I decided to make her ponytail reminiscent of the plume that is on her helmet.  As much as I love the design for Roman helmets (I prefer it actually), I had to give her a Greek one as she was loved by the Greeks where Ares was more popular with the Roman crowd (he'll be getting a Roman helmet).

Persephone's story is probably my second favorite myth, so I'm pretty fond of this young goddess.  As a young springtime goddess, I had to put her in pinks and/or greens.  Overall, she's very pink.  When we see her in Cupid and Psyche she's in the underworld.  I want her to almost glow against the background.  A spot of light in one of Psyche's lowest moments.  In my head, they become close friends after everything is resolved.

Hades was a bit of a tricky design.  He has to look very much older than Persephone, but I also didn't want to make him look like an old man.  So I pulled the "they're gods they can look however old or young they want" card.  I imagine Persephone being about 18-19 to his early to mid 30s appearance.  While its still a large age gap, it doesn't feel as creepy in my opinion as a grandfatherly looking man with this almost underage girl. 

Our male lead, Cupid.  Cupid was fun to work on, though the wings are a bit of a challenge.  I wanted him to be carefree man-boy.  He qualifies as an adult, but still has the energy and cheek of  a child.  He's impatient and has to get his own way. His major character development arc is going to be him maturing and becoming more responsible and understanding.

As I've said before I want Psyche to have very little fuss about her. Her sisters are going to be more elaborate in costume and hair.  They're going overboard trying to look good.  Aphrodite is going to be all sex appeal.  I want it so that she doesn't look like she's trying to be pretty.  She's naturally pretty and doesn't focus on it.  She tries to hide it and fade into the background.

Until next time!

Hera, Artemis, and Apollo Designs

I've been busy the past couple of weeks with my sister's wedding, but here is some of what I've been working on.

I didn't really have a concrete design in place for Hera when I started working on her design, but I knew i wanted her to be regal.  I really like her final design, but it looks like I might have drawn her about a head height too short.

I've always seen Apollo as being a bit of a jock.  He's kind of the perfect guy, smart and athletic.  I also picture him being ridiculously tall.  I tried to make him as "square" as possible design-wise since he is the stable one compared to Cupid.

Artemis is athletic and confident.  I finished Apollo's design before hers, so referenced his design when tightening hers up.  I might still be changing her hairstyle a bit, as I've realized that she looks a lot like the Artemis from Young Justice.

More Doctor Who portraits

Here are some more of the Doctor Who portraits I've been working on.  I'm finished with the new series and am onto the Classics.  We've got the 9th Doctor, Capt. Jack Harkness, 8th Doctor, Dr. Grace Halloway (from the Doctor Who 90s film), 7th Doctor, Dorothy "Ace" McShane, Melanie Bush, the War Doctor, 6th Doctor, and Perpugilliam "Peri" Brown.

I'm putting finishing the rest of them off to the side for a bit, since I'm starting work on a project which will hopefully be announced next month.  Next week I'll put up some more of the Greek mythology character designs I've been working on.

What I've been up to for the last month and a half.

Sorry for the radio (blog?) silence guys.  It's been crazy for the last month or so.  I had a death in the family, my sister just had her bridal shower (which my other sisters and I planned), and we're about a month out to the wedding so it's not going to get any less busy.  So here's a large-ish post of what I've been working on since I posted here last.

Lets start with my Cupid and Psyche Project.  I've pretty much finalized the look of my Zeus and am narrowing down a number of the other gods and goddesses we'll be seeing.

I've also been making Doctor Who stickers for my Redbubble.  I'm working my way down the Doctors and their companions.  I'm going to be starting the 9th Doctor and War Doctor soon.

Lastly, in honor of Sailor Moon having a new anime and the original anime being re-liscensed and re-dubbed, I've drawn up the scouts (or senshi in the original Japanese)

Hopefully I'll get back over here again soon.  If you want more frequent updates or a faster way of getting in touch with me check out my Tumblr.   Link is at the top of the page! 

Demo Reel update

Just got home from the Renaissance Faire, so I'm going to update my Demo Reel over here before I pass out.

Psyche Dialog Test

I've been working on a dialog test for Psyche over the last few weekends to test out her design.  I'm pretty satisfied with it.  This is the furthest I've taken my animation in a while (where I've made an attempt at cleaning it up).  I also voiced Psyche for this one as I have not been able to find sound clips I like from the actresses who I've mentally cast as Psyche (mainly Amanda Seyfried and Emma Stone). 

I'm trying to figure out how to work my newish Storyboard Pro program so that I can start seriously storyboarding out parts of my script.  I'm also working through the script editing it.  I'm also going to try and get one of my sisters to look it over during their spring break, fresh eyes and all.

See you next time.

Sketch_Dailies and some quick (like 30 second) life drawings

So, I've been super busy and running around getting stuff together for the Gallifrey One convention (Doctor Who convention-I totally met Arthur Darvill and Billie Piper!)  and haven't had the time to upload stuff on to photobucket to put up here.  If you're following me on Tumblr (link is above) you've probably seen most of these, but I like to spread things around.

I've been participating in Sketch_Dailies on Twitter.  They give a topic each morning and you have to come up with a design that falls in the category.  I haven't done all of the days, but I've done quite a few.

9 and Rose above London

Just noticed it's been a month since I've posted over here.  As I've said many times before I am just horrible about updating over here.  If you want to stay more up to date with my art you might want to check out my Tumblr (I also post work in progress images over there as I work on projects.) Anyway I've been writing and sketching doodles in my sketchbook for the past month than really working on finished artwork.

I've been working on a commission for my sister for the last few weeks.  We're going to print this out poster sized and take it to be autographed by Billie Piper at the Gallifrey One convention next month.  This has probably been one of the most challenging pieces I've ever done.  Big Ben in particular was very difficult.  While the final piece is not perfect I really like the simplicity of it.

 I'm going to be working on some new Doctor Who Valentines to pass out at Gallifrey One, so I'll post those as the convention gets closer.