I MUST SUCCEED!

Before I get to the good stuff, let me first express my love and adoration for printmaking. This was the first semester that I was able to branch out from the required core courses and start picking an area of focus for my major. It’s incredibly fun, allows me to work at my beloved passive-agressively small sizes, and it’s the closest I’m going to get to a durr-hurr-hurr “drawing” major. It’s not so much the print-your-own-holiday-cards/scrapbooking BS as much as it is “I can make multiple prints and essentially PRINT MONEY~!”

It also means that I can now make pictures small enough to scan! Y-yay…?

This is the first intaglio print I’ve ever done, drawn straight onto the plate. I based the image on the story of Cúchulainn and Scathach b-because I got really into that kind of crap thanks to Shin Megami Tensei: Nocturne… DON’T JUDGE ME. Coo Coo Cachoo looks totally off (what long flowing man hair?) and the spear looks more like a glorified toothpick, but I tried to squeeze in as much as I could on that 5″x6″ plate. For the record, Scathach’s cray-cray anatomy was completely on purpose as I want to have a deep and passionate affair with Mannerism. Oh long, slender, curvy frames and nonsensical anatomy and perspective, where have you been all my life? ♥

Here’s a lager/detailed version of the header. The scanner did some crazy things to the color as I had left on a lot of plate tone for this particular edition of the print. The registration is also terribly off because I hate doing bordered stuff with a burning passion. Here’s what the editions are supposed to look like in all of their black and white glory.

Printmaking is also great because I actually somewhat like what I make in that class.

What, WHAT?

Granted, I still have negligible confidence in my “art” and abilities, but not being completely by what I create is certainly a start. Who knows? In a few years I may actually willingly participate in critiques. Ooh, let’s not get ahead of ourselves there, old girl.

Also, if you want to, uh, take one of these prints off my hands, don’t hesitate to ask. I made about 12 and already gave away 2 to friends.

And now, back to our regularly scheduled Tales of College Art Critiques…

My two art courses this semester (Figure Drawing and Intro to Printmaking) have been surprisingly devoid of vomit-inducing pretension.

Okay, there was one instance but the chick involved got shot down in such a glorious manner that it makes it all okay.

Figure drawing has been an overwhelming disappointment; we’ve only had one female model–one model. The TA had to supplement this staggering FAILURE by making us do crappy exercises involving stuff like drawing our own face really, really big (hahaha because I just LOVE my own face and drawing ludicrously huge) and drawing our hands… really, really big.

Critique rolls around, everyone tacks up their hands, and the magic begins.

The chick responsible for numerous eye-rolls and the strong desire to eviscerate myself this time is someone I shall dub “Artist With a Capital ‘A’.”

Capital “A” was in my 2D Fundamentals class when I first enrolled in the university and was insufferable back then. She’d string together art terms that she didn’t fully comprehend and spew out the most bizarre and poetic bullshit I have ever had the pleasure of listening to. At one point she even busted out a Bob Ross fanned brush and immediately lost any morsel of credibility she had accumulated in her entire life and managed to stun the Professor and his TA for a good while afterwards due to her sheer Idiocy. All in all, just a generally annoying individual and difficult to deal with.

Anyway, the critique goes down and the TA goes around pointing to the various drawings and asking the class to say whatever came to mind, and, oh, did she have some things to say.

Capital “A” graciously offered her nuggets of wisdom for each and every picture until we reached the picture that would ultimately lead to her undoing.

The TA asked the class which pictures weren’t as successful as the others. Capital “A” pointed to mine and another person’s. She remarked, “Well that one is much too light [in regards to mine], and the other one is too dark.”

Without missing a beat, the owner of the other picture turned to her, completely deadpan, and exclaimed “Well maybe that’s because I’m black.”

At that point, two most wonderous things happened. Capital “A” went completely numb with embarrassment and, probably, the sudden realization that she was, in fact, a tremendously huge tool. The class also erupted into a fit of impish glee and I fought down the temptation to tear my shirt off and bust out the Mayan war cries of “GOTCHA, BITCH, GOTCHA!”

All in all, a very uneventful semester in terms of making me sad and angry to be an artist. Oh sure, in printmaking a lot of people have incorporated copyrighted characters into their work, but that’s perfectly acceptable due to the nature of printmaking itself.

Another day, another day.

Stay tuned in for next time. I’m taking Hypermedia (aka making arts on the pooter) next semester, so I’m sure we’ll have a few winners in there.

In a fit of insanity I actually put forth a sliver of effort and actually followed through with a stupid fanart idea! ¡Dios mío! These things are supposed to rot and fester within the confines of my mind so as to not plague the undeserving masses! What was I thinking?!

Well, I was thinking that Altoh should use his Miss Priss ponytail to do battle with Ranka’s prehensile hair blobs. I mean he’d whip that thing around like a Tranny with bad extensions, and she’d just deflect that crap right back at him.

Surprisingly, I don’t really care for any of the characters save for Cheryl and the late-night office pervertsr. In fact, the only thing that makes me pumped for each episode is Yoko Kanno’s return to SWEEPING, CHILL-INDUCING MUSIC. If she can create a score on par (or hopefully even better) with her work on Sousei no Aquarion, then I can walk away from the show completely satisfied.

Picture done in 15 minutes in ArtRage 2 because I am anal even when it comes to stupid crap.

_{Pity. I really thought the Open Source Sac Project had a future. Such is the transient nature of life.}

Oh,fanboys.

I have such a delightful love-hate relationship with you. I pretty much hate everything you are and stand for, but, by God, do you make my day brighter and serve as a constant reminder as to why I’m not a complete failure as a human being! Not to mention the fact that, this crap just writes itself. Bravo, fanboys, bravo!

By now, most of you have surely heard of the horrors of yaoi-paddle spanking—a largely nonconsensual form of con-harassment and weapon-based glomping. However, this primitive and disorganized practice pales in comparison to the unequivocal genius that is the Open-Source Boob Project.

This lovely idea comes from one of the great minds of our time, livejournal user “theferret”, a weasely (HAHA, small rodents, eh, EH?!) guy who falls on the far-right end of the Fanboy Sexuality Spectrum, fanboys who have developed a bizarre sense of entitlement in regards to women/companionship.

Note: The far left of the FSS are the fellows with 2-D complexes who think a lover’s skin is supposed to feel like 360-thread count cotton and the middle ground being a hazy grey area of socially-adjusted chicos who may or may not actually exist in real life.

For those of you who have no desire to wade through an endless sea of whining, useless back-pedalling, and the overwhelming feeling of are you kidding me, the project boils down to this:

Guy wishes to extol the beauty of the female form (read: TITTIES~♥!) by handing out buttons that say, “Yes,” or “No,” to ladies (read:TITTIES~♥!) so that they may advertise to fellow con-goers whether or not it’s alright to approach them and ask (if you’re sans button then, supposedly, no one will approach you at all… maybe) if it’s okay to touch their breasts. It’s 100% consensual (the woman can refuse anyone she pleases) and everyone wins! Guys get to fondle multiple women for no apparent reason and the groped masses get… wait, what the hell.

Let me try this once more.

Guy wishes to extol the beauty of the female form by reducing all women to nothing more than a pair of fleshy headlights and uses this as a justification for a one-way grope-fest. This is further vindicated by the fact that the women actually have a say in which random stranger gets to give the ‘ole beanbags a squish.

No, no. Still not quite right.

Guy couldn’t get a prom date in high school and now thinks the fairer sex (read cancerous masses attached to beautiful breasts) owes it to him to let him preform impromptu mammograms.

There we go. Much better.

Have a good feel (OOH, RIMSHOT!) of the project now? Not completely grasping (I’M ON FIYAH!) the situation? Well here are a few choice quotes that you can really get your hands on (GOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOAL!):

“This should be a better world,” a friend of mine said. “A more honest one, where sex isn’t shameful or degrading. I wish this was the kind of world where say, ‘Wow, I’d like to touch your breasts,’ and people would understand that it’s not a way of reducing you to a set of nipples and ignoring the rest of you, but rather a way of saying that I may not yet know your mind, but your body is beautiful.”

No, friend, a more honest world would be one where you out and out state that you’re reducing a woman to nothing more than a walking rack and that you have no desire to know a woman past her body yet still want to get a feel in.

Yet it wasn’t a come-on, either. There wasn’t that undertow of desperation of come on, touch me, I need you to validate my self-esteem and maybe we’ll hook up later tonight. There was no promise of anything but a simple grope.

I’m pretty sure the only ones coming off as desperate and in dire need of assurance are the ones with the grabby hands. Maybe it’s just me, but anyone who would willingly allow strangers intimate access to their anatomy is more than likely fairly confident (or a prostie!) in themselves.

They were awesome breasts, worthy of being touched.

Uh oh, boys! Your entitlement is showing! I would be lying, however, if I said I wasn’t morbidly curious as to the sorts of breasts these troglodytes consider unworthy of a hairy-knuckled caress.

We liked to express adoration of her body, and she liked the compliment of being desired. It wasn’t a one-way flow; it was a stream of compliments being passed back and forth as we explored that small zone of her body, a My God, these are beautiful breasts you have, along with the backstream compliment of Thank you, you’re worthy of touching them.

Uh, it’s pretty one-way there. I don’t think you’d be too hard-pressed to find a guy who couldn’t pony-up a diarrhetic stream of empty-flattery in exchange for a free squeeze.

That exchange of happiness where one person are told with gropes and touches that they are desirable and the other is someone who’s allowed to desire.

Apparently groping and happiness are interchangeable. Wonderful. Whatever happened to telling a person you desire them with words and sentiments? Why that’s a novel idea indeed!

I could go into how something like this isn’t entirely unexpected given how nerd culture adheres to an entirely different set of norms and principles (and how even these are usually thrown out the window in a con setting), the effects on non-participants and the social dynamic in a con setting, peer-pressure etc., but I’m too busy treading the line between complete disgust and unbridled amusement. Tag-team, jp meyer!

Instead I’ll opt to lament the passing of an era. One where men had to complete the tasks necessary for reaching second base. Like buying you dinner, telling you your hair smells pretty and your outfit looks nice.

Or hiring a prostitute.

COME ON.

So the next time you’re struck with an idea on par with the Open-Source Boob Project and wish to tell the world about it, I want you to calmly sit down, slowly remove your head from your rectum, scrape the fecal matter from the various crack and crevices (I AM TOO GOOD) of your face, and DON’T DO IT YOU DUMBASS. KEEP YOUR MOUTH SHUT AND MAYBE ONE DAY YOU CAN FOOL SOMEONE INTO LOVING YOU. DON’T EVER BRING IT UP, AND IF ANYONE FINDS OUT, DENY DENY DENY.

Allow me to personally extend my love to Mistress Hannah for being a veritable encyclopedia on all things Soulja Boy.

I love Noein as much as a humorless, vile harpy woman can, but the show can pretty much be summed up by the repeated mantra of “YUU! HARUKA! KARASU! RYUU NO TORQUE!“

That and the expulsion of glow-y crap from one’s body.

Oh, the glow-y crap.

Other than my speed run through Noein, I’ve pretty much gone cold turkey from all forms of entertainment from Nippon-a-go-go—save for them there vidya gaymes occasionally. Chalk it up as the real world slipping me a note in my locker saying, “I really, really, really like you. Please go to the social with me?” and me answering a resounding “YES!” complete with girly stationary and heart stickers. There’s also the crippling poverty that always accompanies the end of a semester to account for (perhaps I could also credit the 8+ months of, uh, willful unemployment—MEA CULPA AHAHAHA….haha…ah…), so no picture book goodness… or food… or prescriptions. Oops.

Meanwhile, my precious little slave girl, Becca, has been churning out entries and comics like sweet, sweet butter, but putting them up requires effort that I can’t afford to squander on anything not school-related.

Hold tight, my sweets. More crappy and art are surely coming down the pipe, and chances are if you read this blog you already possess infinite patience.

My dearest friend and domain host, Brian, kindly informed me the other day that people still come to this sad excuse for a blog.

Apparently, a whole lot of people.

As such, I have decided to shoulder the burden of becoming the megalomaniac figurehead of a NEW and SUPER ULTRA EXCLUSIVE blogging collective for all anibloggers.

What is this sleek, shiny new group called you ask? Why, I have dubbed it You Are a Fucking Nerd on the Internet (hereafter referred to as “YAFNI” for the sake of convenience).

Fear not, beloved readers, for I care about you so much that I’m extending this offer to all of you for one time only. In fact, you don’t even have a choice as to whether or not you want to join!

Do you spend a repulsive amount of time and money devoted to the act of watching cartoons?

YES!

Do you write about your shameful pastime on the internet for all the world to see?

YES!

Then, congratulations! You’re automatically a member of YAFNI! I’d even go so far as to say that you’re pretty much a member if you even so much as check your e-mail on a daily basis!

Your only real obligation as a member is to continue to humiliate yourself via chronicling your further tumble down the rabbit hole of NERD SHAME and GEEKDOM. There is no set schedule or prompts because, by golly, you do such a great job of embarrassing yourself all on your lonesome! Like writing about how you spend more money buying tiny plastic man figures than on art supplies you need for your major, or how you spent more time creating a monster fusion chart for Shin Megami Tensei than you did on studying for your Psychology exam! OH BOY!

Also, always remember that your accomplishments online have absolutely no bearing (if any) in the real world! So remember, no matter how many followers you have online, the fact remains that you’re probably a sad, lonely person once that computer screen flickers off! Regardless, YAFNI is a flexible group, so feel free to still act like a complete and total asshole if it helps you fill the empty, gaping void left by a lack of human contact and affection as well as a sense of fulfillment as a productive human being!

Now get those little fingers clacking, and have fun kids!

P.S. - Under the Ladies Bleed From Their Genitals Clause (in effect since the DAWN OF TIME) and in partnership with the This Is the Internet Act of the early 90’s, Female Bloggers are allowed to think and feel whatever they goddamn please, and are entitled to their opinions in much the same way that everyone else is. What a novel concept.

P.P.S. - Clannad was utter crap. If I wanted to go watch a bunch of dead-behind-the-eyes chick crying, I’d go watch America’s Next Top Model and then stare at my reflection in the mirror afterwards.

The frustrating difference between my friend Ashley H(errr) and myself is that though she has the talent, I have the ambition. I’m pretty convinced that everything she touches, effort-wise, would turn to gold if she’d just polish it a little, and I’m equally convinced that there’s no point in me even trying. Before this begins to sound like I’m begging for pity, I should probably also add that when I had the opportunity to do something, I let it pass me by because I draw too slow and was stubbornly trying to not ever improve. So while I do have the ambition, and I now have the drive, and I’ve let my opportunities pass me by.

This reminds me a lot of Ebichu’s mistress.

My artistic success is much like her fickle boyfriend. Both would rather belong to someone else, are impossible to reach when I need them, and won’t commit. For Ashley, talent is more like Ebichu, patiently waiting for her beloved mistress, scrubbing the blood stains out of her panties. I have to bribe talent with easy sex, liquor, and deviant behavior.

The only exception to this rule is when it comes to sewing, and that’s probably because Ashley refuses to let me teach her. I love to sew, but since school started, I haven’t had time, which is pretty bad, because i’d like to have a full dance ticket cosplay-wise. I’ve been taking it easy since my three week sew-a-thon to finish Suiseiseki in time for Anime South, and I haven’t the money to dump on the five yards of fabric needed for Sophie. What’s worse is that my boyfriend (MY BOYFRIEND) plays along with me, and we haven’t found the patterns for our Ice Climbers costumes yet. I have a feeling I’ll be sewing my fingers to the bone this summer, as I’ve been thinking of making a Zero-Suit Samus with my brand new serger.

I’ve heard rumors that people actually like hearing about cosplay, especially all the in-progress details, so I’ll tell a little about my setup. My mom taught me to sew and finaggled my aunt into giving me her own Singer, and my first sewing project was my Shippudden Ino. She’s pretty nitpicky about seams and neatness, and hopefully I’ve taken after her, although sometimes when I’m under the gun I get a little sloppy. My Singer was able to do elastics and fishnet, and I messed up the timing sewing velveteen for Sui, so I need to get him (the Beast) fixed. Beauty is my Janome that I got for Christmas, and I used her to finish up Sui and for school sewing projects. I’ve done some last minute sewing, but I really prefer having plenty of time to work. I cannot style my own hair, so of course I cannot style wigs, but I have a friend who’s pretty good at it and we do a lot of joint projects. I work from a mixture of bought and self-drafted patterns, and when I get in a sewing mood, I have no time for drawing.

I dont have any in-progress shots to post right now because I’m not working on anything at the moment. If people are interested, I can post the pictures of the costumes I’ve worked on.