Category: Redefining Evil

Art!, Redefining Evil

Fall Cast

mary v.

orchard

So working on this piece got my extremely sentimental and nostalgic. Missy Higgins’ song “Warm Whispers” made it worse. Any time I am in between creative projects (not that my art crawl isn’t taking up ALL of my energy), it’s always this cast that I come back to. And I got sad, too, thinking about how this picture would have to be set in some alternate timeline when Danny doesn’t get brutally slaughtered at the end of the story. ;_; But it’s so richly autumn because my family was talking about apple orchards today and the weather this weekend has been cold and sunny, which is perfect.

I thought I had more to say about this, but all I’ve been thinking is that maybe I should rewrite “The Terror of Night” from scratch so I can really, really eliminate all the remaining awkwardness. But I always feel compelled to rewrite precious projects when I’m not working on anything else, so I don’t know how seriously to take myself, haha.

Oh and Sotoka is the scarecrow in the background hehehe.

Art!, Redefining Evil, Sun-Walking, Writing!

Puppies & Pecs & Pretty Girls

mary v.

I’m torn between the impulse to write all about my creative happenings now, but without full access to anything I did traditionally, or to wait until I get home (in like 2 weeks) and just take a MASSIVE DUMP (sorry, but the excitement of having my own flatbed scanner back at my fingertips just brings from me disgusting phraseology).

Well, then, to tide me over, in list-format, here’s what I’m working on:

  • The Cadence of a Restless Heart pages, 17 full pages coloured and 1 in the works, with 3 more inked pages to follow
  • Redefining Evil/The Terror of Night revisions — I did most of them, but I’m still meaning to change the ending a little bit. A LITTLE BIT. Only a little. I finally figured out a good direction for the remaining characters to go in, and it’s exciting.
  • …SUN-WALKING WOOO. No I mean I guess I just opened it up and GOODNESS that story’s got the best action sequences! Plus when I reached the end of what I have written in “Sky-Dancing,” I was like ooo boy…now where was I going with that? Turns out for a change I DID write down my planned ending and I went “oooohh” when I read it, and there’s not really that much more to write and I’ll be much happier with a rough but at least finished draft of the story. 0___0
    Okay and I’m coming back to this a few days later (after my second of three finals!) and I got back into working “Wind-Running” because I had this breakthrough that sometimes I make my characters overreact where in life people would respond more subtly, so like, Isaac isn’t as angry at Levi as he was in the last draft. Also, “Wind-Running” will be almost completely told through Lucy’s journal entries, up until the point where she gets tranquilized by Keenan, where it will switch back to third for the duration of the story. This is because you really need to be inside Lucienne’s head as she transforms, otherwise it all seems too simple.
    The changes I was proposing to Sun-Walking, such as solidifying Helios and whatnot, I realized some of them started going overboard. I do want to keep that one told in third-person, so that means I don’t want to rewrite the whole thing…I will need to dig into it at some point and hone down Helios and the Sun-Creatures, but in general I don’t want to rework as much as I did before.

And now…without further ado, a sketch dump!

I mean but seriously. This is my favorite gif I’ve ever made. I MEAN BUT REALLY. Also, this was a reasonable movie.

So I JUST finished this listening to Cartel, which is one of the two or three bands I will always and forever associate with Micah. And okay I didn’t JUST draw him without a shirt on to indulge myself. Okay it was mostly that, but he wasn’t wearing a shirt in his first scene in the new draft of “Wind-Running” because Levi decides to go there in the middle of the night so what dude sleeps with a shirt on in the summer?
Anyway, this is another attempt to get the hang of lineless digital work. I’m a lot happier with it. I almost just went through with the sketch I had laid over it but finishing most of my schoolwork made me ambitious. Also lineless work is a lot easier when I can still kind of work with lines…TCoaRH helped me figure out to just use the pen tool and layer over it to blend things, rather than copping out and using the airbrush like I thought I needed to in the past.
And okay I’m trying to convince myself that my favorite part of this isn’t just his pecs because they’re his pecs, but it’s not working.
Oh and don’t worry, he’s not the only person I’ve been drawing naked lately. I did a nude of Lucienne last night in my sketchbook. o_O And on that note, I mean “nude” as in the kind of pose I did during Life Drawing, not “HUAAA HERE ARE MY TA-TAs” but…I don’t think my intentions were as noble with this picture.

ball-smooch-new

This was seriously my FIRST satisfying lineless piece I think…ever. And it kind of slipped away from me because things got so busy here what with classes ending and my uncle dying. I did it when I was doing the latest (and hopefully last) re-write of the ballroom scene of ToN (yes that’s right, I am implementing the new acronym of RE with its new name…Margaret), even though that’s not even what Ingrid was wearing in the scene. I just kind of like the fairytale effect of this picture but then it’s like OH THEY’RE BOTH VAMPIRES THEY’RE DEAD THEY COULD KILL YOU IF THEY WANTED MUAHAHAHA delicate kiss

There’s definitely more of a vampire vibe in this picture, but I’m not as pleased with it and I didn’t work on it for as long (obviously). On another layer I had a doodle of Danny getting the wind knocked out of him when Ingrid punches him in the gut right before this part in the story, but it looks like I deleted the layer. xD The rewrite of this ballroom scene reached a nice compromise of all the previous drafts. Danny and Ingrid do get a nice kiss, but no sex…Ingrid gets mad, but she doesn’t blow up at Lacy (that scene was very contrived, and long-winded, and a perfect example of what I was saying earlier about subtlety of reactions)…Ingrid gets in touch with her life back at the force because I introduce her mother, but I didn’t get carried away with that by implementing the whole huge “foster home” concept and all her rather obnoxious (and contrived) friends that were in previous drafts. Plus I got to write another scene of Micah being paranoid and sick and that’s always fun.

Then here’s Ingrid looking badass as usual. I don’t have a ton to say about this one except that I like the movement of her skirt. When I did this I almost decided to add all my other heroines but unless I’m feeling particularly dedicated, usually the thought of doing that is much better than the product.

Then here’s a biology lesson I learned. I feel pretty dumb because I really should have known that incisors are different than canines, but right after I read that in my notes on animal digestion, I searched “incisors” in my latest ToN draft and I used it like six times in relation to what I meant to be their fangs. e___e; Oh well, at least I learned it now.

Well, I think that’s the end of my seemingly endless stream of art updates. There are some more I won’t get to till I’m back State-side and settled, but this is pretty satisfying in the meantime.

Art!, Redefining Evil

Julian

mary v.

I will always love this character. I love his design, I love his delivery, I love how long he’s been around. I love that he’s old, and he bears his age — he’s got nearly-grown children — but in some ways he’s still got the same heart that got broken by his family as a teenager. This is Julian Evereaux, and I miss writing him. He was the lead in the first short story I ever wrote for school in 7th grade, although he was around 11 years old in that. I wouldn’t even dare trying to incorporate a character like him anywhere else, unless I could get as deeply into him as I did in “Redefining Evil.” I mean, in a way he’s tragic to the core, because his grieving is a fundamental part of his character. His grieving makes him strong, unbeatable, really. He and Danyil make a great pair in RE, and I started with a sketch of the two of them but as soon as I drew these fingers I knew I needed to do Julian alone.

Art!, Redefining Evil

sketchbook paper is GRAINY

mary v.

OH HEY!

What has it been, like, three months since I’ve done a substantial blog entry? Okay, well, given I had just enough energy to get these pictures on my computer, it might not be literally substantial…but I’ve done some work! Also, pretty exciting and validating is that I got two pieces into Murphy Square and two into the All-Student Juried Art Show. Granted, last year I was way flippant about them and so I submitted shitty pieces to both…but still, it’s not like I was guaranteed getting in this year! My stupid umbrella made it into both. I wish I felt more connected to it! It was literally one of my brain storms. “Wow, I have a lot of feelings and a lot of time right now…I’m going to use water color. And I love my watercolor pen right now. Hey, I’m really into umbrellas…” But I knew right after I did it that it would be a likable piece, and so it is.

Anyway, I’ve had some extra time on my hands (sigh) lately (or else I’ve been avoiding homework…really successfully), and I just finished all six seasons of the new launch of Doctor Who (won’t say anything here — just look at my Tumblr), and so what do I do in interim times of my creative life but pick up Redefining Evil. I finally got about to totally rewriting Lucas’ death scene because it’s pretty much driven me crazy since I first novelized it (beaches and funny jokes are much better in pictures and much more difficult to pull off in writing). I changed it from a beach to the forest outside the police headquarters castle and put it in the middle of the winter. Much easier to draw meaningful things from the scenery in that case. It didn’t end up any shorter though, so I guess somehow I still had things to say in there.

So what do I always do when I write about Lucas but draw a ton of doodles with him and Danyil. I mean duh. But the one I did tonight turned out really nicely.

Also, lately I’ve been feeling drawn to contouring — it’s always been a really expressive technique for me. So following that Lucas and Danny piece, I contoured Lucas’ face. I scanned it in and then had this brainfart when I realized that digital contouring might be a REALLY good way to draw some sophisticated complexity out of my digital work. Because my problem with digital lines has always been that they suck the life out of my image. There’s really no way to kill contours because they can’t help but burst with energy. So…ta-da! A new method to mess around with for the next few weeks! And now, images.

lucas-danny

lucas-contours

lucas-contours-complexity

WHOA WHOA WHOA THIS IS COOL
2lines

Art!, Emotional Breakdowns, Redefining Evil, Writing Journey

Danyil

mary v.

So in the past few weeks, I’ve been redeveloping the past between Danyil and Ingrid in response to a very logical observation on behalf of an editor. Basically, I needed to recreate Ingrid’s descent from human to vampire because her original story didn’t fly with my handmade vampire logic. A baby turned into a vampire would remain a baby. A baby born a vampire will age to decrepitude. As it stood, Ingrid was a baby turned into a vampire. Now I don’t think she’d have quite the power she does as an infant with an undeveloped neuronal crest (thus, no periphery nervous system, thus, no feelings).

Anyway, I needed Ingrid’s past to fit into the RE time frame with as little disruption to her relationship with the cast as possible. Since that meant turning her into a vampire somewhere in her teens between Lacy’s (13) and Micah’s (17) age, I made a very deliberate decision. I would NOT make Ingrid a victim. That would have been the easiest way to totally annihilate the integrity of her infatuation with Danyil and his reciprocated affection. It would also blow up my idea of vampires completely.

So, I decided what she did to force Danyil to turn her into a vampire in order to keep her from dying. I’m not going to say it here because I want to say it in conjunction with something else later on, and besides I’ve already gotten pretty far off-track from what I meant to write about.

I started working on a short manga that takes place right after Danyil turned Ingrid into a vampire. It felt so good to get back into manga frames and speech bubbles. And Danyil is and always has been my absolute easiest character to draw successfully.

That led me down a very nostalgic path through the pages of Nikkei. It’s partly because of how much amusement I find in looking also at where Ingrid (“Mikara”) started off. She was sort of a flake in Nikkei (her and every other girl in the story). But she was definitely close to Danyil (“Eripmav”) and Alexander (“Alucard”), and that much hasn’t changed.

Anyway, I drew this macho picture of Danyil in his old (creepy) kimono top thing that was his “uniform” in Nikkei, and it made me realize how fundamentally unchanged Danyil’s image has stayed — yet also it made me realize how much better he looks now.

I mean, yes, Micah and Andrew grew visually, but they also changed. I messed with their hair. Their hair colors. Etc.

Danyil’s still rocking the long black ponytail and only in one of his many appearances did I even alter it (I’m not counting “Lannen.” Just no.), and that was because he, as Erik in “Rebels”, took on a significantly different vibe than usual.

Anyway, my ranting can be done now. I’m just going to post a few pictures of Danyil for my own amusement. There’s also a ton about him here.

I think the interesting thing about Danyil especially being so constant is that…he’s sort of the villain. He’s the one that rarely copes with his emotions properly. Maybe that’s one way, then, that I don’t feel like I’ve improved as I’ve matured. No, I don’t throw fits like I used to, but I don’t think that my responses to periods of high emotional stress are healthy. So maybe in that way, I stay with Danyil because he stays with me.

That, and I mean, he’s the only male character of mine whose muscles are so damn ripped.

Art!, Redefining Evil, Writing Journey

personal accomplishment ftw!

mary v.

citygroup-sm
(bigger version of this image on this page)

My lucidity is waning and it’s almost my bedtime (work early in the morning), but I wanted to say AHHH!

One of my biggest challenges as of late is finishing a traditional project — if it isn’t obvious enough. So I did this big group picture of the RE cast (including Andrew AND Sotoka — for once!) AND it had a nice cityscape backdrop AND SO I inked it, and then I was like omg forget this, I’m just going to do it digitally. But then I couldn’t get Danyil’s stupid face right digitally (gradient shading ftl), so that became my motivation to follow through with coloring this image oldschool with colored pencils, because the shading therein is so much easier to control.

SUPER HAPPY I DID.

I’ve been working on it since, like, Friday. I really took my time on each person AND the background, and I’m so glad I went with a much more saturated blue than I originally planned for the sky/shadows. I think it gave the piece a really thick, good atmosphere as opposed to washing it out like I usually do. All I did to it after scanning was upped the contrast and applied this new “salt/pepper” filter that I had which did exactly what I wanted it to in terms of cutting back on the graininess that results from colored pencils.

So, anyway, I was inspired by that pretty-colored character line-up I did from October 2006. I was hoping to outdo myself, but I outdid myself AND surprised myself. So I put them together to show off:
lineup-comparison
Okay so the only downside is that they all look really grim in the new one. But I’ll justify that by saying that the novel is much more serious than the manga was. >.o;
The only character missing from the new one is Tamae. I eliminated her character pretty early on in the novel version, which I think led to Danyil and Ingrid’s relationship (in the manga, the very conceited and rather useless Tamae is head-over-heels for Danny, who gives her a pity kiss after the ball at the same place in the story where Danyil and Ingrid now make love o__O; *weird thought*). Anyway, a lot of the cast is lined up in both pictures except Sotoka and Lacy are pretty far from their originals. In the top picture, from l-r we have Sotoka (far background), Danyil, Ingrid, Micah, Julian, Lacy, and Andrew (seated). In the bottom l-r we have Danyil (then Eripmav), Ingrid (then Mikara), Lacy (then Shani), Micah (then Myoku), Julian (then Takai), Tamae, Sotoka, and Andrew (then Darrin).

—-

I realized (or have for the first time felt capable of articulating this fact) that the way I obsess over then-and-now’s seems a little self-absorbed. Like, “ooh, look at me, I’m so good now” but inside me, it’s (usually) nothing like that.
In some ways, the growth of my artwork/characters is something I can document — “Look, I learned how to do backgrounds/add depth/work with a light source” and it says that I’m not moving through life without any progress.
Even beyond that, it’s just simply that I love my characters. It’s quite clear I’m incredibly committed to this cast. I was committed to them even prior to getting accepted by PYP, which is how it ever got accepted for publication in the first place. I believe in the stories that these people have to tell, and by this point it hardly feels like I’ve concocted them myself.
As one of my all-time favorite authors put it (Jonathan Stroud on his facebook page in reference to Bartimaeus),

the character just pulled me happily into the story. Which is what all good characters do, I think, whether you’re a reader or a writer…

Redefining Evil, Writing Journey

Awkward Promotional Moments

mary v.

(My mom was getting blood drawn at the hospital today. She has very stubborn veins and so finally they used a bigger needle on a new vein, and blood gushed all over her arm and the floor.)
Nurse: Oh, I wish we had a vampire here right now!
Mom: Well, my daughter’s vampire novel is coming out next year!
Nurse: (Wiping up all her blood) Oh, really? That’s very cool.

Art!, Redefining Evil, Writing Journey

probably, but not yet

mary v.

I’ve probably got a new layout for OMS lined up, but I don’t feel like making it live yet because I’m not entirely sick of the one that’s currently up. But the image that I made for this new layout is really good, I think. And I also got to stick with the original pencil lines and stayed low-key for the colors, so it’s somewhat refreshing.

memories-forblog
It was kind of in celebration of the fact that I rewrote the one major scene in RE that I was planning on rewriting after the last critique I got back. I closed all my RE drafts open and got off my computer and drew. This was very rewarding. Except that I did lose the .psd file by somehow force-closing PSP so that it didn’t even prompt me to save. So now the design is what it is. D:

Redefining Evil, Writing Journey

Skeleton

mary v.

So, because the upbeat song on the radio (Hot Chelle Rae “It’s All Right”) doesn’t fit what I’m trying to write, but I don’t know what of my own music I feel like playing, I decided I would take a brief intermission and muse in a journal entry.

Last week I received my first of many critiques/full edits to RE from a new editor in training over at PYP. It was rough for me at first. I don’t have much energy to spare once I get home from work (8 hours a day with elementary school kids, running around getting them to recess and lunch and so on). Plus, the critique was very raw and honest (classic C style, as far as I can see, although it wasn’t even her) and I was a little bit at a loss. Once more, just like when the things with RE and publication got underway, I was in the thick of a totally different project (Apprentice of Light) and I didn’t want to give RE attention. It was especially hard because the biggest problems observed by this wonderful editor had to do with aspects of RE that I simply hadn’t changed since its days as a manga four years ago. In other words, they were silly things once it came to my attention that they were there. It was frustrating and it laid out a lot of things that I decided needed dealing with in the manuscript.

Well, yesterday evening I suddenly got the urge to get into these revisions. Naturally, I came up with a few significant things I wanted to alter in the manuscript, but I think once these issues are smoothed out, most of the other problems this editor had with the story will also be eliminated. The most significant things are elements straight from the manga.

It made me a little sad. It’s like saying goodbye to my childhood. I told my dad that the skeleton of RE is very much the same as that which I started off with. But more and more of the scenes from the manga are being weeded out of the novel. It makes sense — I’m removing my tenth grade vision of the story and replacing it with my twenty-year-old’s eyes. All the better for the story. But it’s another door closing for me. Granted, it’s opening two or three windows.