Convention Excitement and New Website Update

Sorry for the radio silence everyone! It's been a mixed bag of bothersome snow, overtime at work, and health issues :< However I am happy to report, if you haven't seen it on my Facebook page yet, that I have secured a booth at Virginia Comicon's 2 day event this November 22nd- 23rd! In what spare time I can manage to grab I've been writing lists, working on the next Alencia book, working on prints as well as button and sticker ideas, and even figuring out how to get my hands my on a standing banner to bring to conventions! I'm SO excited by the possibilities for cons this year. I still won't get to attend as many as I would like due to my full time job but it just makes the ones I can attend that much more special.

I'm also hoping to snag a table for Nekocon this year. I was very impressed with how far Neko's Artist Alley had come since I last tabled there in 2010. While fan art is still prominent there were so many original comic creators (and crafters!) that it made my heart sing! At last one of my most accessible anime conventions has become more welcoming to original content creators. However I have to wait till the first week of May to register so fingers crossed!

In the mean time here is a sneak peek at a work in progress print I'm currently painting:

Also you may have noticed in the previous post that I have been tinkering with wordpress in an attempt to get a blog/portfolio site together as a main hub for my artwork. Well Wordpress has not worked out for me, but instead I've started a site using SquareSpace. I'm still working on getting my domain name attached to it but GoDaddy is not as user friendly as I would like >_> And while I have figured out how to do this in the past I'm still having trouble so please bare with me. Until then you can see my new site (with this blog attached to it!) at Francesca-rowan.squarespace.com/ I'm really loving the interface and that fact that I could import my entire blog over to it. I'm going to start experimenting with updating the blog from my website so we'll see how that goes but I might hold off so folks who have stuck to this blog so long can still enjoy my updates without missing anything. But when/if I start doing blog updates from there I'll give this blog a heads up so no one misses it.

Speaking of missing updates, if you follow me on Facebook be sure to follow these instructions so you can keep seeing updates from the pages you like (otherwise Facebook will try to corner us into paying for people to actually see our updates. I'm thinking about breathing some life into my google+ page or making a new one. Would anyone be game for that?)

So as I go on I'll be sure to share more peeks at con goodies as I make them. Stay tuned and as always, thanks for sticking with me! <3

New Years WIP

Hello all! I hope you all had a fun and safe new years celebration!

I spent today aggressively cleaning my house, leveling up Pokemon, and trying to work on some digital work that I've been meaning to finish. Case in point, my Lor the Gravedigger illustration that I started earlier this year. I was happy to find that through my work on it today I was able to figure out how to successfully (in my opinion) draw blood/gore. I also decided to try and simplify the bushes in the background. I was trying to do a more 'painterly' style with them and I've finally realized that kind of style just doesn't work for me. I just can't work with it successfully so I tried to break down the shapes and shades even more. I feel like I'm about 90% done with it. I've also realized since the entire scene was put together after drawing and coloring Lor herself, I don't think the lighting will ever be 100% correct. But I'm okay with that. I'm really happy with the track this piece is on and thought I'd share that. Hoping to finish it up soon!

Cosplay Progress- 'Fancy Dog-Tier Jade'

Hello everyone!

Sorry it's been silent around here but things have been busy as usual. Getting ready for Nekocon was busy and luckily not toooo stressful but it was a good time in the end. I didn't really get any photos of me wearing my cosplay but I did take progress photos as I made the Dog-tier hood, which turned into a lined full circle cloak.

Side view so you can see how long the 'tails' of the hood are.

Front view.

Detail of the hood's trim, which I got at Joanne's. It was expensive but made less so with the help of coupons. I also added wire to the inside of the hood's rim so I could pose it for photos as well as making it easier to wear.

For the trim around the cloak I used a beautiful black lace that I had picked up back in England. I had a lot of it luckily and there was more than enough for this cloak. I had originally bought the hood's trim for the cloak rim but when I decided to make it full circle there clearly wasn't enough. I also added little satin bows to the front as a cute detail.

And here is a peek at the interior lining of the cloak. It's a black fabric with grey designs of birds and flowers in a classical style. I had used this fabric in high school to make a bag out of (which I still have).

Once we get some time and maybe some snowy weather I want to take better photos of the whole costume together. I spent enough time on it I need nicer photos of the whole thing :P

I'm also currently working on a commission that I don't want to share until it's done, and I'm going to try to gather up sketches to scan soon and share before our four weeks of overtime hits at the very end of the month.
So stay tuned!

Sick Day. Gotta Work on Comics.

Had a sick day today. Managed to get some work on Alencia: Tomb of the Unspoken pages done when I wasn't sleeping or moaning in misery. I missed working on her adventures so much!

This girl.

Is getting into lots of trouble.


Stay tuned for more!

Digital Love

I'm still busy packing for the move so in the mean time here are some digital doodles I've been working on now that my new computer and programs are up and running.


A drawing prompt from El Goro for the steampunk story we've been working on together. The gun turret on the ship has malfunctioned causing a comical backlash of soot. It will show better once it's colored.


Layla, from the steampunk story, at 50 years old. She's gone blind by this point. I need to gather some more references for her.


Joke gift for my RP buddy Seir of our Werewolf Apocalypse characters.


And now for a colored piece! A portrait of my newest Skyrim character Frejah. I'd been wanting to play a Khajit and a mage for a while so now I am! She came out much cuter than I expected :P

My creation! IT LIVES!

As an artist I love to create things. Most of the things I create, like my characters, are stuck in the 2-D plane of view. But lately my desire to learn to sculpt has overwhelmed me so much that after gathering more supplies I have started trying to bring my characters to life; on a 3-D plane. I love action figures and statues (especially anime ones) so while using some that I own as inspiration (and some great reference) I've started sculpting a stand alone Alencia mini statue. Here are some photos from the last few days of working on it.


The wire armature covered in tin foil. This actually started as another character but I then decided to make it Alencia instead, so as I went on the pose was adjusted. You can also see my sketchbook (one of many) with notes and diagrams of how I originally wanted it to look. Now I'm more loosely basing it on my notes.


With sculpey on her. I put on a basic layer of clay to cover the whole form up (save for the hands, I plan on doing those near the end) and then added more volume where she needed it based on her body and her clothes. I then added details of the shapes of her clothes, trying to make it look somewhat separate from her body but as a part of the overall statue.


Detail close up. Here you can also see the bit of balsa wood I have lodged in her hand. That will be making room for the sword she will be holding. I'm very excited to make a miniature of her blessed sword. I hope once my prop making gets on to bigger projects that I'll be able to create a full sized replica of it. *Dreamy sigh* Her other hand will be holding a lantern. I'm not look forward to making that as much as the sword. When she's fully done and painted I plan on having her sit on my convention tables. I'd also love to make more of my characters and have already been drawing up possible design ideas for future figures.

I've also been having some computer trouble lately so while my iMac (and all its programs) are at the apple doctor I'm on my laptop, with almost no programs on it so even photo editing is a no-go right now. Also still trying to get the laptop to talk to the scanner, so until those two kiss and make-up there's not going to be much for me to share :/ But hopefully the iMac will be sorted out soon and then I'll have loads of art to share!

WIP Shots

Hey everyone!

Today I bring you some WIP photos of the current Alencia: Tomb of the Unspoken comic pages I'm working on. I made my goal of inking two pages before work today so here are some teasers of the raw inks:





I'm very happy with the pages so far. I think switching to using a brush for inking was one of the best decisions I've ever made :P

WIP Grave Digger

Here are some WIP screen shots of an illustration I'm currently working on.

It started as a doodle of my new Grave Digger character but soon I realized I wanted it to be something more.

I started lightly sketching in a background and some little monsters for her to be fighting off with her shovel. At first I drew little imp-like creatures but I felt they looked too sympathetic so I decided to try out some more bestial creatures. I tried to mix rats with possums and make them look slightly more alien with extra eyes and boney extrusions on their backs.

After about 7 hours total, this is where I'm at now. I'm quite pleased so far but constantly finding things that need tweaking or adjusting. However digital drawing and coloring is something I feel I need more practice in so this has been a very fun and beneficial practice piece so far.

I'll be posting more WIP shots as I continue~

Maids and Dwarves

Had some time between jobs recently (before the black friday/weekend rush) so did some art-ing.

My maid character Alice during a service rush.
Pencil, Watercolor and Ink on 90lb watercolor paper, 5.5”x8”

Some digital WIP doodles of a new Dwarf guy and new costume for my poison brewer/necromancer Zona.

More to come soon, if I survive this weekend :P

Kale Turnaround

Hey everyone!
I've been busy with both my day jobs lately. But now that training is done with the new one, and my other job has hired some new seasonal workers, I'm finding more time for art now. Lately I'm working on some character turn-a-rounds for upcoming comic projects. Yesterday I started one for Kale for the updated incarnation of her comic I'm hoping to start next year.

Here's a sneak peak:

A big thanks to folks at the facebook page for helping me out with critiques! If you want to follow along with project updates on my facebook page come join in the fun!

I've also got some more work on my Alencia comic done that I'll be sharing soon too. Stay tuned for that!

There's also comics and original illustrations up at my Etsy page if you're looking for some gift ideas, something to cover that hole in your wall, or a treat for yourself!

TotU pg 5

Hey folks! Managed to get another page drawn, but won't have time to add tones for a while so here is the inked page in a more raw stage. I did get some work done while I was gone, especially for this comic, but showing it would spoil too much of it so for now we have this raw page. I'll post more when I can. I start training for my new second job bright and early tomorrow ;3;

I hope you've been keeping up with El Goro at Talk Without Rhythm Podcast for "31 Days of Halloween." He's been able to keep updating every day this month, much better than I have, so go reward his hard work by telling him how awesome he is. There's a facebook for the podcast too.

See you folks later~

ART PLANS.

Hey guys! It's been a while but loads have been going on. Mostly busy at work. But now I'm starting to settle down a bit and I've got plans. ART PLANS.

+VA Comicon Small Press Table
You've been hearing me talk about this for a while but that's because I'm super stoked for it! My first table at a non-anime convention! I've been making plans for merch that I want to make and bring including the new Alencia comic, buttons, prints, and some other small items like key chains and book marks.

+Media Studies
There are things like animals and landscapes that I feel like I need to draw more of so I'll be doing a lot more studies to get in the swing of drawing them. For now I'm using certain sketchbooks for this as well as making ATC style cards that I'll be doing studies as miniature illustrations on. I'll be posting them to my tumblr and then grouping them here too. Here are a few so far:










+Or Maybe Not Webcomic
I've got scripts from Ryan lined up and am currently working on the next update. Looking to have it up by Friday since I have a few days off work. I'm going to try to update it as much as I can between now and VA Comicon since I plan on making post cards to pimp it out for the con. I also need to just sit down and draw more comics.

+Kale issue #2
Is still in progress! I've been rewriting an reworking things and I'm starting to think that I should do it as a one shot book like I originally planned but maybe start it over after all. I learned a lot from the first issue but the more I look back at it the more I see things I wish I had done differently. I'm going to keep working on it and when I come to a final decision I'll talk about it here. But either way Kale's story will continue.

+Alencia Comics (and Contest!)
Writing for Alencia's stories has been much easier. She comes more naturally to me than Kale so her stories will be more in number and varied. I really like working in short story/episodic format and I will continue that. I'm also really enjoying mixing horror with fantasy so that is a plus!
Alencia's first short comic will be featured at my table at VA Comicon and will feature FAN ART! I have a fan art contest running from now till August 4th, where anyone who sends me fan art for Alencia will be included in the book (with their name and information to their website) and will receive a free copy of the comic for themselves! Just send me a copy of your fan art (large file size, TIFF, 300dpi, I need it large so when I format the book it will print nicely and not be pixelated) to fran_rowan(at)yahoo(dot)com. Here are some references for your use:
-Alencia close up
-Alencia and Human!Theloyn height chart in color. Theolyn hasn't been introduced in his human version yet (he appears as a cat in the comic for now) but if you wish to draw him then by all means go for it :)
-Preview of the comic. Also for your inspiration here is the preview of the comic featuring the first 6 pages.
Also please keep fan art to PG-13. The comic isn't really rated but it's not really hardcore or anything. If you have any questions please let me know. I'll be sure to share the entries and their artists here too!

I'm also making jewelry that I'll be selling on my Etsy page soon so keep your eyes peeled for that! This post is epically long as it is so goodbye for now and stay tuned!

Cafe' Chit-Chat

Alencia and Kale hanging out at a little Cafe’ in Stonebridge. Alencia insisted they have the afternoon tea sampler.

I wanted to show their different mannerisms, draw some everyday armor/new clothes for Kale, and have a cafe setting (I saw Anthony Bourdain: No Reservations first episode about Paris last night. I want to visit there very badly).

As for the city of Stonebridge it’s a cross between Venice and Paris. It was once two towns that decided to join together into one city. They did so by building a stone bridge between the two towns. The bridge is very large and is a symbolic landmark (based on the Rialto bridge in Venice). There are lots of smaller bridges that join areas of the city together, this is just the most famous one. I’ll be doing some concept art for it soon.

WIP sketch. To be colored eventually.
Mechanical Pencil on 400 series Bristol Board

Alencia Preview/Let's Talk about Kale

Here's a little preview from the 17 page Alencia comic I'm working on. After I finish this baby up its' back to work on continuing Kale's story. (I've been feeling really conflicted about it lately but I'll explain a bit more later.) Here's a panel from page 11.

Here's Alencia casting a spell on her sword while fighting the evil undead.
Very fun to draw. Done with non-photo blue pencil and a Pentel Pocket Brush Pen.


The reason I've been feeling conflicted about Kale's story is mainly because of the circumstances surrounding me doing it. When I originally sat down to do her story I gave myself less than a year to do it and publish it in time for a convention. I originally wanted it to be a stand alone book, a self contained story. It ended up being cut up and will be maybe three issues, possibly more, by now. This was also my first time doing a self published book (aside from a mini comic done for my 'Intro. to Sequential' final project a few years prior).

I'm glad I did the first issue of Kale, and I'm really proud of the work I did, but now the art is almost two years old, and my mistakes are becoming even more glaringly obvious to me, to the point where I'm becoming more and more embarrassed about it. If you compare the comic pages to the panel I posted above the improvement is obvious. But I'm glad I did it. I learned SO MUCH from actually getting off of my ass and self publishing the first issue. I wouldn't have gotten that knowledge and experience in a classroom alone.

I'm just faced with some possible choices right now for Kale issue #2. I want to finish the story, its' just the start of it is very rough. It needs polishing but if I restart it then I feel I'd be letting down those people who bought the first issue, and myself. I don't want to get stuck in the endless trap of redoing pages to the point that I don't get to move forward with other projects or finish this one. It's a commitment and I want to see it through to the end.

I've also considered completely dropping it in favor of doing other projects but again, I feel I'd be letting myself and others down, and I can't have that. I want to be a woman of my convictions and finish what I start.

So after I finish this 17 page intro story of Alencia, I'm going back to thumb-nailing and planning out the next issue of Kale. I've also been universe building and have been doing LOTS of writing. This next issue of Kale: Lost & Found is going to blow the first issue out of the water in terms of quality and art direction. To the point where I might offer the first issue with the second as a bonus :P And/or offer a discount on the second issue to those who bought the first one; which I still have a stack of books for.

Either way, this story will be told, and I will make it better with every brush and pen stroke. You have my word.

Coming soon!- 10 page preview of Kale: Lost & Found issue #1, for those who need proof it exists! It may also come with commentary :P Haven't decided if I should further embarrass myself yet... I'm also going to post little insights into the world of Kale and Alencia while I build their universe, so look out for those!

If you read my wall of text, thank you. I'll have more art up soon, and I'll try not to make these text heavy posts a habit :P
Thanks for sticking with me!

Guardians of Metal

Working on a new digital piece, wanted to start it before I completely forgot the idea. A new metal themed tribute piece to my favorite band 'Blind Guardian.' I decided to try another Metal tribute after I had so much fun doing the Dio Tribute, and thought why not do one for my favoritest band ever? I'll talk more about the overall idea and themes used once I finish it.

Soon I'll have some commissions and comic pages coming up, so stay tuned!
\m/

Digital Process

Happy 4th of July everyone!
To celebrate I thought I'd share my digital process on my most recent piece, my tribute to Ronnie James Dio.

When I start a digital piece I like to use a pink color (at 50% opacity) to do the under sketch. I'm using CS5.5 and they have a brush option where the brush has a feathered end. I like using this one because it mimics using a brush and I prefer the quality of lines I can create with it.


Next I use a solid black to draw out my line art on another layer.


For this one I figured out the colors as I went but usually I prefer to have at least values and an idea of colors figured out ahead of time. It really does save on headaches. I do the colors on various other layers underneath the line art.


I color the foreground and then do the back ground last.


When I'm done I save a Photoshop file with all the layers, then I smush it together (flatten) and save it as a Tiff, then make smaller jpeg versions with watermarks for putting online. I like to save larger files of everything in case I want to print it or use it for something else later. I learned the hard way not to flatten your only file of a image in case you need to edit them later :/

Well, that's how I work digitally. I hope you all have a great 4th of July! Stay safe and have fun!

Story Boards

Hey guys!
I'm working on a project for Digital Drawing where we have to show 'time and movement' and one of the ways we can do this is with story boards. I decided this is relevant to my interests so I sketched up some thumbnails of my character Alencia walking through a dark hallway in an underground tomb. I'm going to play with lighting and showing mood. You can't see it in the roughs but she is carrying a skull under her arm. It's part of a story I'm writing for her, I may have mentioned it here earlier.
I put the sketches together into a gif to show how I'm going to put the finished, refined, storyboards together. Apparently Disney does this when they get their story boards together how they want it so it creates a mini animation.


These are just roughs but they will line up better for the finished product :P I'll be sure to post this when it's done! Now its' off to bed for me, Friday means early class. Goodnight folks!

Work Work Work this Weekend

Hey everyone!
Aside from my portfolio project that I posted previously, I have been busy with more school work! Game Design in perticular. Here's what I've been working on:


Redesign of the tunnel level. Darker version vs. lighter to show details. Also a scale of how tall the entry ways really are.



I hate ships right now :< I'll map out the bottom half of the ship but not for right now. I'm going to get some more landscape/areas done next and get started on the game booklet. Also hoping Unity will download on my iMac properly so I can render some of the island for it too :D


Here's the box art after I received critique and changed it. I like it a lot better now.

So after all that work I managed to find time to draw myself something. Particularly Ramla (my Scion:Hero RP character). She's been bugging me to draw her all week :P

Looking forward to coloring her. Also as much as I love that hand gesture, it is a bitch to draw without looking weird :/ Hands are weird...

Also finished a drawing of Alencia before I went out for the weekend.

I missed doing black and white contrast with ink so I went for it. Thumbnailed it in my sketchbook and threw it down on bristol board. My fingers were, and still are stained with ink. I've missed that :)

Back to classes tomorrow, stay tuned for more work! I should have some ATCs coming up soon :D

Fall 2010 Update

Hey everyone! Now that my work for issue #1 of 'Kale: Lost & Found' is over I can finally get back to school work and preparing for Nekocon. And did I mention midterms this week? Heh, yeah. So before I dive headfirst into studying for midterms I want to share what I've been doing all semester. I'm gonna split this into two blog posts to avoid spamming; one for school work and one for personal art.

+Game Design
For my game design class we're all working on our own video game that we're doing concept art for. Mine is a free roaming mystery where you play a military scout exploring a newly discovered island that your kingdom hopes to conquer. But your team mates go missing and you explore the island to go find them. I'm trying to make the island a character of it's own and eventually create an unsettling environment from the sunny landscapes to the dark underground. I'm also trying out watercolor for the concept art with some colored pencils mixed in. It's good practice but I need to look up tutorials too.





(not complete, I still need to go over it with some colored pencils)






+Senior Portfolio

For this class we have four projects to work on that we get to choose. (We're still on the first one and its' technically midterms so you can tell I'm feeling antsy). Aside from those we've also been working on logos, letterheads, invoices, and now we're starting business cards.



Here is my logo.

As for the 1st project I am redesigning the album art for Blind Guardian's 'At the Edge of Time.' I really don't like the over CGed, and frankly bland feel of the album art so I'm hoping to do something worthy of them. To show just how hard I'm working, here is a collection of thumbnails I've been doing for the project over the last few weeks.




I am SO SICK of thumbnails. But its just as well since I'm now starting the actual project. Here's what I have so far of the pencil drawing. The concept is that I have a Norse goddess of virtue (Snotra) having triumphed over a tyrant ruler. I listened to the album and read the lyrics and one of the reoccurring themes was of a united people overthrowing a ruler or government. I also wanted to keep the subject matter somewhat rooted in fantasy because of Blind Guardian's influences and past album covers.

For the goddess herself there wasn't much I could find in the ways of art for her (as posed to Athena who I didn't' want her to look like). So I researched viking women's clothing and based her clothing on that. My reference before that was a toga-ish robe that I constructed from a bed-sheet and wrapped my room mate up in but that still helped immensely with the draping. I'm finding that the more research you do for something the more rooted in reality it is, and the more real it feels. Its' something I've been told by teachers recently that I need to do more of. I completely agree and now that I'm putting it into practice I'm finding it works ever so nicely!




Stay tuned for my post of personal work! For now I have some homework to do :P