An unfinished painting of Vladimir that I forgot about. I should probably do more stuff with this kind of perspective… good practice.

Lip drawing practice!

A bunch of glossy lips from various sources. This was a lot of fun!

There had been a Darkstalkers Create a Character Contest a while back, and this was my entry. I didn’t win anything, but it was fun designing a character that might fit into the Darkstalkers Universe! Here’s the description I included:

Character Name: Vasila The Wise

Monster Type: Witch

Fighting Style: Weapon/Short Range Magic

Physical Desc:

Height: 158 cm
Gender: Female

White hair down to her thighs. Wears a red shawl, and a dress to her knees with a rooster emblazoned upon it. Wields a giant pestle and rides in a mortar.

Weight: 54 kg (mortar is 230 kg, and pestle is 120 kg)

Additional Info:

Vasila is the daughter of Vasilisa the Beautiful, a woman who was freed from her abusive step mother’s grasp and later married to a great Tsar in the 1600s by the workings of the ancient hag of the forest named Baba Yaga. On the day of Vasila’s 13th birthday, the Tsar’s monarchy was overthrown in a bloody revolution. Vasilisa the Beatiful and the Tsar were killed, but Vasila managed to escape. She fled helplessly into the wilderness in the wake of the destruction of her family’s kingdom, only to find Baba Yaga waiting for her in front of her chicken-legged hut in the depths of the forest.

She asked the old hag who she was, only to see the hag disintegrate into dust before her. All that remained was an enormous mortar and pestle and a single blue rose. When she touched the pestle, the dust began to swirl into a whirlwind, surrounding and enveloping her. Darkness and ambivalence seeped into her veins, and centuries of knowledge were etched into her memories. Her humanity forever altered by the dark magic of Baba Yaga, she continued on in the role of the forest hag.

In present day, she appears to be in her late twenties. She wears the mask of an old crone when dealing with humans in order to maintain a desirable level of venerability. She antagonizes humans that enter her realm, but occasionally reaches out to those that are pure of heart. She claims to preserve her age by drinking a tea made from blue roses.

She is largely uninterested in the affairs of the Darkstalkers, but she appears to have a soft spot for Anita. Her immense dark power and wisdom have attracted the attention of those that wish to bring about a new battle for supremacy…

A 3-hour portrait from a photo reference. I’m really happy with the colors!

I think this is a Japanese swimsuit idol named Rina Aizawa… but I’m not entirely sure.

I’ve been meaning to do some Tales of the Abyss fanart for the longest time, so here it is!

Luke and Tear have long been one of my favorite couples in RPGs. It’s not hard to like any couple that’s suggested in Abyss though, because the characters are so well developed across the board, but these two play off of each other’s traits so powerfully by the end of the game.

Please forgive me for not finding a way to include Jade in this picture.

I wanted to try some new coloring techniques, and I went ahead and used them on a fanart of Aina Satisar, one of windy-castle’s original characters.

I hope Windy gets her comic going someday, because her characters have a really nice Tales/Grandia feel to them, and that’s totally up my alley!

I bought Final Fantasy Tactics: War of the Lions during the Square-Enix sale that was going on a while back.

Agrias, I’m sorry I said earlier that Tactic’s Ogre’s Ravness was better than you. Her outfit has more bells and whistles, but you are even more badass than I remember when I first played Tactics back in junior high.

Also, let’s not talk of Tactics Advance.

Been so busy with work and renovation of a room in our townhome lately, it’s been hard to find much time to draw.

My wife grew up reading all of the Dragonball comics, and we watched some Dragonball Z for nostalgia’s sake. I really want to find a good box set of both the comics and the anime some day, but there just isn’t a really good version of either that’s readily availlable at the moment.

So yeah, here’s a quick Bulma!

I’ve been on a bit of a hiatus due to some vacation time, but its time to get back to art!

I still think I might do more with this piece later. This is Sir Vladimir, the green knight you might have seen a few times in my sketches. He has ultra sideburns and is a real badass on the battlefield. In the castle, however, he’s really regal and formal; he has that same crippling level of register that afflicts men in Jane Austen novels.

Work in progress….

I’ve been really busy with work lately, but I managed to find some time to do a quick paint of Melia(r) from Xenoblade.

I still haven’t finished the game, but I’ve gotten the “seventh character” in my party, and I’m all worked up because of how complicated this makes things for Melia(r).

I really, really like monolith studios games. I can’t wait to hear more about the new project they are working on for the Wii U that looks to be a bit of a mix between Xenogears and Xenoblade. I’m keeping my fingers crossed that it will go to Europe first for localization again because the VA work in Xenoblade is SO AMAZING.

Opal Sariel, a character from my original story, Discretional Valor.

I spent a long time working on her hair and lips! I hope to be as good as Sakimichan someday with lips…

I’m very happy with the results of this one.

A commissioned portrait of a friend.

Again, I am trying to use more of the SSS effect in order to make the skin of my characters more vibrant and alive.

This is Mia, an original character I’ve showcased a few times. While most of my drawings of her have taken place early on in the story, this takes place much later.

She (among other characters) undergoes a bit of a change after an extremely critical and devastating turning point in the story. I’m trying to capture that with a costume change, and a very different haircut. 

I have been trying to learn from cushart’s vivid use of color, and his liberal use of the SSS effect. This drawing is the result of some of that experimentation.

Cushart is a Taiwanese artist that does a lot of high fantasy game art and romance novel covers. See some of his work here!

This drawing is a scene from my story, Discretional Valor. Silas, Opal, and Sir Vladimir (you can just barely see his helmet in the background) are waiting in a carriage for the arrival of Lily, the Ogmian Princess. They are to transport her to a Lord Vodnik’s castle, which is about four days East of Ogmia. This is the first time all three of them are working together. Opal is concerned about the consequences her absence from the capital city may cause among the gang that collects interest on a debt from her weekly. Silas is too naive and excited to be spending time with Opal to comprehend her concerns, and Vladimir is so preoccupied with the mission that he has barely spoken a word.