Get out and play!

Well it has been a while since my last post, mainly due to my computer being down. In that last post, I had bought my first skirmishable airsoft gun. Since that last post, I've acquired a bit of gear. We're talking things from 4 new AEG's to a plate carrier, and so on and so forth. The thing is, what good is gear if you aren't using it, right?

Well after a number of events including a job upgrade, getting a car, and other quality of life changes, I had been talking for the longest about trying to start an airsoft squad. Unfortunately a friend decided that he wasn't going to get into the sport. He hadn't bought anything yet, so no real loss for him. Me on the other hand, that's a different story. As enthusiastic as I am about the sport of airsoft, there was no way I was going to let anything stop me especially after the gear I've bought. It was going to happen, it was just a matter of when.

Well after my birthday, I heard that the weather was supposed to be unseasonably nice for January. I didn't have work interfering the day before, not did I have any errands to run. On January 18th, I finally got out and drove to the closest airsoft park I knew of in Edwardsville, Illinois. The Bing Field. I got up early and packed all my gear in the trunk of my car and headed on out.

The Google Maps navigator guided me there with no problem. I had no idea what to expect as I pulled into the lot. I could see cars already there with people hanging out loading magazines, talking smack with each other all decked out in their camo's. It was a little intimidating for the first time going but this was a day I was talking out just for me. I was not about to welch out on it now that I was there.

I popped the trunk and started putting my gear on. I had a plate carrier, hip pistol holster, thigh dump pouch and shemagh (outside of the required goggles and mesh mask to protect my lower face). I was going for a PMC contractor look for my first day out. I didn't have the stuff I wanted to actually try for an actual soldier with full camouflage gear. None of it was a prerequisite to play, that was just a thing i wanted to do. I grabbed my Ares Amoeba M4 CQBR (close quarters battle rifle) and started heading for the main building everyone was congregating around. Seemed like a logical place to go to register for the days events.

I headed in and was greeted with a long line of soldiers not getting their lunch but bb's and other such gear they needed beyond their registration. I made my way to the head of the line and registered and got my bb's. I immediately made my way out and started loading mags and I took long enough that I skipped the first game to make sure I was prepared and had everything I needed.

As I waited for the next game so I could get assigned to a team, I talked to a dad that was standing outside the field looking on with curiosity with his 2 sons who were also waiting to play in the next game. They were like 7-9 years old at my first guess. He looked intrigued and as I spoke to him, he admitted that it looked fun enough that he might have to get out there with his sons to try it himself.

The first game I got in was on the spool field. The first and overwhelming detail was the gratuitous amounts of mud all around especially in the wooded fields. I'm sure it's not always that way. It's WAS winter and there was precipitation recently. As we lined up for a Team Deathmatch and made the initial charge, we started the sprint to push as far forward as we could. It was during this sprint that I realized something.

When I was getting my gear on I loaded up on magazines filled to the brim with ammo. As I started the sprint, I realized that the drop leg dump pouch full of magazines strapped to my thigh was jostling back and forth with its extra weight and it slowed me down somewhat. That was my first lesson I learned and decided I was going to lighten that load on the next match.  I got shot for leaving myself exposed on an angle that I wasn't thinking about, so I had to remember that too. I needed to think about angles of attack. As the dead pool filled up and we were allowed to respawn back into the game, I tried again. This time, I got outgunned and took a bb off the forehead. I had no other choice but to call my hit and laugh at the fact I got headshot in my first game. After that game ended, I went and put my drop-leg dump pouch in the trunk until I could decide out a better way to run it.

As the day went on, I realized how much I enjoyed using my Amoeba. It worked like a dream and then after a couple games I started to get low on ammo, so I decided to try some .25 gram bb's. I had been running the basic .20 gram bb's up to that point. I heard people talk about the heavier weight bb's being better for accuracy so I tried it. I was in Discovery Mode today. I loaded up the mags with them, and as we walked on the field to our team's spawn location, I took a couple shots and was surprised by how much less flight path deviation I had on my shots. The bb's were going to my red dot's reticule instead of my reticule's vicinity. It was official, I was a convert. After I use up my remaining .20's, I don't see myself really more. It's all about .25's now.

In one game, I decided to test out my DBoys G36C with electric blowback. I enjoyed trying to use it. That is up until my motor height adjustment acre in the pistol grip decided it wanted to move on me. The worst part was I left my tools in my dump pouch! I had to resort to only using my CO2 pistol which worked fine enough seeing as it was the weapon I had on me that was actually shooting. After the match ended, I went to the car and got it working again. I have had the G36 for over a year so I was not surprised. I just need to figure out a way to secure that screw without risky techniques (like super glue).

At long last, the day finally came to an end and I began the walk to the car and
put all of my gear away and started the drive home.

I probably had one of the most awesome drives home reflecting on taking a day just for myself and going to play Airsoft. The only thing that made the day even better was as I was starting to cross the bridge over the Mississippi river revealing the sunset, at that moment the solo from the Mastodon song "Oblivion" started up and I burst into laughter over how great the timing of everything that day panned out.

It was a good day and I would be going back in a couple weeks for the Operation: Arctic Assault...

And this time, I'm bringing friends...
*Cue dramatic music*

Until next time,
Darrick

Really? Tuesday?

So, I decided to take the plunge two Saturdays ago and order my first legit airsoft gun. I picked up an assortment of other things as well. I decided to order a Double Eagle M89 SMG-45 (better known as the UMP) from Airsoft Megastore. I had seen it before in movies and such but I became enamored with the UMP back during the Battlefield 3 beta and I realized how nice looking of a gun model it is. It's design is what really caught my eye.

Mind you at the time I ordered mine it was on sale for $100 at the time and that window of opportunity was what really made me actually order it. Mind you at the time I was considering a handful of other candidates at the time. First was the Lancer Tactical M4 series. I was intrigued by the fact that they were so strong and accurate but the thing was they had been catching flack because of the fact that the bodies are made of some sort of plastic. Mind you, specialty retailers have done various forms of stress tests that revealed it only suffered superficial external damage. The functionality was not impacted from the damage that it endured. I was really tempted by that series (and may still get one) but what made me cautious about it was the fact that they shot in the neighborhood of 400 feet per second. The muzzle velocity could be brought down by using heavier BBs, which also means a slightly shorter range but your shots are more accurate at longer ranges. The other thing that left some minor apprehension about getting it was because of the fact that they are SO common. You would be hard pressed to find an airsoft field and where no one there is running an M4. However the other edge of that sword is the fact that gun is so common, means it's going to be really easy to have a teammate toss you a magazine because you are both running the same weapon. It's got it's pros and cons. I was just looking for my first airsoft gun to stand out from the others. I'm really interested in CQB (close quarters battle) and for most sanctioned fields, you have to be using a gun that fires under 350 feet per second. If I find myself playing in more open spaced fields or wooded fields, then I may have to give the Lancer Tacticals a shot.

Another contender was the Galaxy G5M from Air Rattle, essentially an MP5 with an integrated RIS (rail interface system). This was small, compact, had a decent capacity of slinging plastic with a pretty powerfullyat a decent rate of fire accurately. It states that it shoots up to 360 which would be "too hot" for some CQB establishments, but once the spring has settled in from usage, the FPS supposedly nuzzles into the 340-350 FPS range. Honestly I was torn about this gun. I was mainly debating over this one and the JG Sig 552 from Airsplat. I really enjoy the look of the 552 and it supposedly performs pretty well from the videos that I've spotted. It falls in right below the CQB limit, so that was also a bonus. The only thing I had to consider was the fact it was pricier ($120 at the time I was originally looking at it, then it went up to $130) and it had 220 round high-cap magazines. When there are other guns running mags with 600 round capacity, that seems like it would create a little Capacity Envy.

So Airsoft Megastore revamped their website and I happened to notice the UMG (the name it also gets called to avoid having to pay for the Trademarks). I did some research and saw the key things that I wanted. It was compact, CQB legal FPS, full metal gearbox, and a magazine with a decent capacity (300 rounds). I jumped on the opportunity because it WAS previously $120 (which it went back up to a few days after I placed my order). I ordered on a Saturday so I had to wait until Monday for Airsoft Megastore to get my order and process it...

Monday comes, Airsoft Megastore processes my order. They hand it to UPS (Ground delivery).

Tuesday comes, I check the tracking on my order and UPS has shipped my package out. It tells me that I should expect delivery on Friday. I'm thinking "AWESOME!".

Wednesday rolls around, I'm excited I check the tracking and it has changed. I should expect my delivery on Tuesday, Sept. 4th. I'm thinking, "Not so awesome! Does it really take that long to get here?" (Remember, I'm excited to get my package.)

Thursday was uneventful pertaining this topic.

Friday comes along and I tell myself, "Maybe it COULD get here early?" To no avail. That brown truck came by, but for someone a couple houses up the street. Curse you... Later on that evening, I decided to check the tracking on the package again just to see where in the world it is.

The tracking was updated and it stated that at 12:45am Friday morning, my package arrived in the Earth City delivery center (which is a stones throw away from me). So let me get this right...

I am given an estimated delivery date of Friday. It is adjusted to Tuesday (I guess because of weather or distance). The package gets to the nearby delivery center BEFORE they start their deliveries for the day. They let it sit there, they go home for the weekend since UPS doesn't deliver on weekends. Then I realize, this is Labor Day weekend. UPS observes Labor Day so, "3 DAY WEEKEND! lolz". So I get to sit here for this whole weekend wishing while they could possibly be out airsofting themselves! Not likely but theoretically, it's possible.

I'm not mad at UPS, just annoyed by the inconvenience of this scenario. I just felt like posting that. I did say I'd post about my learning experiences in airsoft.

Rule #1: "Don't buy anything on the weekend." I already had a similar rule in general. I don't buy anything on Saturdays because, if you buy something on Saturday it will go on sale Sunday, or worse get dropped in price on Monday.

Rule #2: "The US Postal Service works '7 days a week'". While the USPS does observe certain holidays, they still deliver your stuff on weekends should that be when it would arrive.

Well, I will post a review of all the stuff I got after I've had a chance to test it out. Stay tuned for more. Until then...

I'm Red! Cover me...,
Kash

And now for something completely different!

So I know that I've been rather quiet for a while but I have been caught up with many of the wonderful things  that life throws at you, like work, video games, role-playing game design... a sudden and overwhelming obsession with Airsoft. I will be also posting about the things that I've been learning as I explore this hobby as well as just including posts about just general life observations.

I would also like to say thanks to Aurelas from Books, Bowties, and Balls of Yarn for mentioning the CoI FTW comic strip on her blog! She's a good friend and a kinsmen in our Lord of the Rings Online kinship (guild), Children of Iluvatar on the Vilya server. Her and her hubby Doldin even appeared in the first CoI FTW. As her blog titles implies, it covers crafts, good reads, and amusing observations about things in general. So please, stop by there hang out a bit.

-Kash

New Art Style for future CoI F.T.W.'s

This was a concept sketch for the new art style I planned on using with the CoI F.T.W. strips following the one that I'm currently working on. My intention is to simplify every aspect from the writing, to humor, to style. I'm hoping that doing so will ultimately result in a faster turnaround time from concept to posting. I will no longer for the time being use the traditional comic page layout in lieu of a faster 2-4 panel comic strip.

Daggerborn is the leader of the Children of Iluvatar, and Adanailo is his second in command. By Lord of the Rings Online terminology Daggerborn is a Guardian and Adanailo is a Minstrel. They share a bizarre symbiosis in that Adanailo keeps Daggerborn's spirits up in combat when he should be overwhelmed by the odds he faces, and Daggerborn keeps enemies from turning their attention to Adanailo. There is two sides to Adanailo's personality. There is the upbeat, classical/folk music playing healer-mode (usually indicated by his plumed hat) and the heavy-metal (or Middle-Earth equivalent) shredding, guttural growling, damage-dealing, Warspeech mode (usually indicated by the long black hair hanging down over his face). They have had their beefs with each other but in the end they are there to keep the other going for the sake of their kinship.

Until next post,
-Darrick

Song of the Soulbreaker

I know it has been quite a while since I've posted anything with general hiatus of the chousens, and working on Baka Youjin in between "real" work and so on. So I decided that I'd actually post a writing sample from one of the stories that I'd like to turn into a novel. It's based upon the setting in my roleplaying-game system. This was the intro to the story I tentatively called "Song of the Soulbreaker".
__________________________________________________________
Song of the Soulbreaker
by Darrick Herring

A young boy looks out of his window and is welcomed by the dark clouds looming over his house alone. The temperature dropped several degrees because of the sudden strong cool breezes that seemed to stir up from nothingness and drape across his face like a silken scarf. The young boy readjusts his hair back as it was as he looks down at the congregation forming in front of his house pointing. As he heads in away from the window and the gawking, he returns to his seat in the middle of his room. The hairs on the back of his neck were made to stand on end from the haunting dirge that was being played in his room. He takes his seat facing an older gentleman playing the flute that was producing the haunting music. "Master Volim?"

The older man paused his stream of conciousness to respond, "Yes Rail?"

"Must we practice here in my house?" said the boy with a tinge of disdain.

"Is there a reason that we shouldn't?" Volim looked concerned at Rail.

"I understand that what we are doing is important. I know that I need to learn these songs so that I can help continue the traditions of the G'mil da Kulati," Rail began to feel an intense heat around the neck from Volim's expression. "but it's just so embarrassing having dark clouds over only my house. Everyone else has a blue sky. They will all think we're jinxed or something."

At this time Volim's expression transitioned from one of concern to one of abundant amusement. "Young Rail! Ever the self-conscious one you are. It's a part of growing up for the G'mil da Kulati." he guffawed.

"But Master Volim, there are people outstide looking and pointing at the house. They are laughing." Rail exclaimed.

Volim got up and made his way over to the window to look out and gazed upon a couple children jumping around, singing and dancing about the "sad house" of the village. He then pulled out the flute and blew several notes into it just before the lightning bolt arced down and clawed at the ground several feet away from the children, sending them scampering home. Volim glanced out past the clouds into the cobalt horizon and remembered back when he was receiving his training and had similar anxieties. "I don't think you'll have to worry about those kids anytime soon."

Volim turned around and returned to his seat and looked at Rail with a slightly disappointed look. "K'veh! Those were mere toddlers who still smelled like their mothers behind their ears. You are a G'mil da Kulati, a special honor." Volim leaned forward resting his elbow on his knee and continued. "We play an extremely important role in maintaining the quality of life here on this island. You can't let the mere babbling of babies or the barbed comments of ignorant adults convince you otherwise. Do you understand me, Rail?"

Rail lowered his head and grasped his flute as he muttered, "I understand, Master."

Volim and Rail practiced the song for hours repeatedly playing it over and over. All the while, the dark clouds rumbled and roiled, tumbled and toiled. The run off from the storm hydrated the surrounding crops which all of the farmers in the village were glad to have happen. As the two finally finished their practice, the clouds began to dissipate and and revealed a lavender evening sky above the house. There was a knock on the open door frame. It was Rail's mother.

"Lady Gendarme, please enter." Volim said as he turned left to look at the Lady.

"I take it you two are done for the day? You two have been fluting all afternoon." she asked as she stepped in and rested, back against the wall.

"Yes, Lady Gendarme. We are done for the day." Volim replied as he proceeded to gather his belongings.

"How is my boy doing? Is he catching on well." she asked as she glanced over to see Rail cracking his knuckles before finally starting to slouch a little in his seat.

"He's doing quite well when he's not distracted." Volim turned and smiled at Rail. " He's learning the lighter parts of one of our more important songs now. Your son is quite talented."

"What is it? Song of the Salt-shaker? That's a really odd name for a song." Lady Gendarme asked inquisitively.

"Mother! You're embarrassing me! Guh!" Rail exclaimed as he ran and did a flying faceplant into the pillows of his bed.

Volim's face glowed crimson at the absurdity of the supposed title. He started to respond but remembered that he was a representative of the G'mil da Kulati. He cleared his throat, caught his composure and replied, "I believe you mean 'Song of the Soulbreaker'."

Lady Gendarme, as well as most of the people of the island-nation of Yujia were mystified by the G'mil da Kulati's gift they possessed. Most people knew they were a group of people who were able to control the weather through music. The G'mil da Kulati were vital in the climate control of the nation. By playing songs, they could bring about major changes in the environment. Where there was a torrential storm, they could reduce it to an azure sky with multiple rainbows as the clouds dissipated. They had this gift because the songs themselves manipulated the energies of the world itself. The most important was a song that worked like a black hole for life energy. Anything within earshot, would be drained of some of it's life essence. "Oh! I'm sorry. That does make way more sense. This is all still new to me. I just have one question."

"What would that be, Lady?" Volim grabbed his flute and tucked it into his belt pouch.

"If I understand correctly, that's a rather powerful song. Why teach a sixteen year old how to play something that could siphon someone's life essence?" she asked with a slightly perplexed look.

"A valid question indeed, Lady Gendarme. The song siphons a small portion of life energy from anything that in it's presence, living and inanimate. This siphoning produces a sadness, a sorrow. This sorrow is what brings about the rain and the changing of the seasons. Obviously, that is a very powerful thing to be able to manipulate. The G'mil da Kulati are not just a bunch of musicians that can do impressive things with pretty notes. It's a state of mind and a way of life." Volim started to head down the stairs with Lady Gendarme following behind. "We teach respect, responsibility, and charity. We consider what we do to be a gift. Everyone else does as well. We want everyone to continue considering us as having a gift and not a weapon. We are teaching your son how to use this gift for the good of Yujia."

As they arrived at the bottom of the stairs, Lady Gendarme semi-satisfied said, "Okay, Master Volim. So long as my son is learning about the responsibility that comes with this gift."

Volim opens the door and turns to reassure her, "Believe me, Lady Gendarme. I will teach him well. Rail will be fine."
_________________________________________________________
As is obvious, it goes on from there but this is the setup that I'm trying to use to drive the storyline that ensues.

Hopefully, you find this interesting. I appreciate any questions, comments, constructive criticisms. Please feel free to post. Thank you!

Busy with Another Couple Projects

So as is obvious, I've been rather quiet with work ramping up and and finally dying and people regaining their sanity for the most part. I've started the new year by revamping and re-releasing my manga I worked on a long time ago. I will be posting those pages (once I have a lead on it) on a different Blogspot page and hopefully keep turn it into a relatively frequent web-comic. So my sabbatical has ended on that as well as on my role-playing game I'm designing. Thanks to DanMonster, I'm down to the last 3 out of 81 abilities to detail. Once I have that done, I can begin entertaining the idea of an adventure to test out the balance. I still have to design the magic spells and such but caster classes still have 9 different tactics to use in addition to that. At least it's a place to start. I also haven't given up on the CoI F.T.W. comics. I still have about another 5 worked out that I have to execute. That's in addition to any challenges that get thrown around on here. Updates to come!

-Darrick

Beware the Adanocalypse

Adanailo, our kinship minstrel was apparently taking our extended jaunt in Urugarth a little harder than expected and when Kildano decided to spill the beans... it hits the fan!

-Darrick

Maegbor: A Light In The Darkness

We all learn a little something about our Captain, Maegbor and in some ways, a little about ourselves. It was actually a toss-up between Dold and Maegbor but since Maeg's already been established as something of an excitable character it would probably fit him a little better.

Hope you all enjoy!

-Darrick ^_,~ \/,,

The Inner Workings of CoI F.T.W.

Because of an interest in what actually goes on during the illustrative process of making a CoI F.T.W. I decided to go ahead and edit out the inks and tones to lift the veil and show the horrors underneath. ^_,^ Enjoy!

It is a dynamic process that I use and it varies with almost each strip. For example in #1 I "pencilled" on my Wacom tablet. Got everything where I wanted it, "inked" it, then "toned" it all in Manga Studio Debut 4.0. Because the last panel was so similar and only the expressions had changed, I simply cloned the final product of the first panel and changed Aurelas and Doldin's expressions. A time saver of the highest degree!














For #2: "This Can Only End In Flames" I did the original sketch while I was away from my comp but I put down a simple indication of what I wanted, how I wanted it laid out and then placed the locations of my word balloons and numbered them so that I could decide of the dialogue flowed properly. The dialogue called for Daggerborn to talk several times in multiple panels but he would have taken up too much space to put in each panel, which is why you have his dialogue jumping down to Eranith's intro panel. As you can see I didn't deviate much from the intended plan.











For #3: "Rune-keepers Do It In Self-Defense", I actually did a couple rough layouts away from the computer but I did everything on the computer. A subtle difference to this strip was that I decided to not use tones which hare so prevalent in the first two. I did all of the shading with the pen tool much like I would on a standard fantasy illustration piece I'd do. There were several times where I was working on the reveal of the second panel and burst into laughter by how much stuff was going on to express Narmir's rage using Scathing Mockery on an auroch (the big fat cow with the "dumb" face). It had to be one of the most surreal drawings I've ever done because it begs the question, "Just what could you say to make a cow burst into flames?"








Hopefully, you all have gained a little insight into the creative process that I go through when I work on the strips that tell the tale of my LotRO kinship, Children of Iluvatar. I will go ahead and include a rough of the next strip which I am currently laying out and we'll see what process I take that time!

-Darrick

Rune-keepers Do It In Self-Defense...

CoI F.T.W. #3 is ready to open it's bleary eyes and gaze upon the outside world! Enjoy!

-Darrick

This Can Only End In Flames...

The next strip for CoI F.T.W. is done! Enjoy!
-Darrick

Presenting "CoI FTW"

At long last, I've actually posted something new! I hope to make this a regular strip based on stuff that happens within my LotRO kinship, Children of Iluvatar.

The first strip is based on a conversation I had with our kin's married couple, Aurelas & Doldin about their misadventures out in Angmar.

Enjoy!
-Darrick

Surprise in the immediate future...

I will be posting something a comic strip based on the interactions/events/topics of conversation with my kinship on Lord of the Rings Online. For the time being it's titled "CoI FTW" since I don't want to use the name Lord of the Rings, or Middle-Earth, or anything like that.

I'll post it in the next couple days. Just gotta finish inking and toning the last panel.

-Darrick

Long time no see!

So I checked my DeviantArt page and saw JB actually responded to a note I sent. He's doing good. He's going to be watching to see the BY pages when I post them. He's going to I.T. school right now and is hitting his project hard as he can. I'm going to try and get him to join the challenge just so there's more people involved. Only thing holding my plans up right now is I gotta get the old pages shrunk down somewhere to a scannable size. Updates to come.

-Darrick

UPGRADE!

So a while back I made reference to Manga Studio Debut having moved on to Version 4.0, so since I had opportunity I decided to finally upgrade to it late last night/this morning. I really haven't had a chance to dig into it yet, but I was still able to open/edit the stuff I did with 3.0 so it at least has that done right. I liked the layout and setup of what I've seen so far but only going toe-to-toe with it will tell me what I really want to know about it.

On a side note, Muramasa: The Demon Blade for the Wii is INSANE good! I've been playing on "Shura" mode which is basically Hard Mode because you have to time all of your parries and dodges. I'm only Lv. 18 but I managed to time things right and pulled off a 144-hit combo. I had the hardest time beating a particular boss in the game Yukinojyo Yagyu, but after many tries that I realized I was having a hard time because I was playing ULTRA hard mode because I was trying to beat him without using items! Once I realized that I was able to cook rice balls in the game and could use them in battle, Yagyu went down on the first try. LOL Go food-crafting! It's crazy how good that game is and it's a sleeper hit on the Wii as far as my store is concerned. My goal is to get our last copy of that sold to someone before Saturday the 23rd. I partially have to agree with Dan, that it's an odd choice for a game like that to be exclusive to the Wii, but when you think about it Odin Sphere was done by the same guys and it was PS2 exclusive. Maybe they will make a PS3 game down the road. Maybe Vanillaware is trying to help the Wii out and show that the Wii DOES have some good exclusive titles outside of "X Mario X". To be honest, I've played it with the remote and nunchuk, but I at times feel myself gravitating to using the Gamecube controller. I may give the classic controller a whirl before the weekend is over.

-Darrick

HAPPY NEW DECADE!!!

I just wanted to take this opportunity to wish everyone a Happy New Year even though it IS the second day of the year. May your best day of 2009 be only half as good as your worst day of 2010!

-Darrick

An aside...

As I told Dan, on January 1st, 2010, I'm going to send him the content of Mugen Densetsu: The Yzyrra Chronicles. I will be sending it as it is with whatever sections covered at that time. It'll be good to have some critique based upon having seen actual rules instead of just discussions of game design theory. I don't have the monsters/beasts/creatures numerically designed yet (so far there's just rules for facing adversaries that were humanoid) but the rules for designing them will be a bit more concrete after seeing how the characters are set up.

While this is a very vague post, I feel this is a very concrete step towards the progress of my role-playing game system.

Also, I haven't forgotten about posting my manga pages. I also need to go back and find my old pages so that I can get them copied down so I can scan them without having to splice them together seeing as the old pages were hand-drawn on 11" x 17" comic book pages while the more recent stuff was drawn on my computer with a Wacom & Manga Studio Debut. I haven't done anything except sleep and work for the past month or so because of doing overnights. I haven't seen this coming week's schedule but I would believe that we should be done with that. Only time will tell...

-Darrick

What do you guys think?

I've been rather quiet with general "stuff" going on so I admit my flaws. I haven't been illustrating as much as I could/should. I think I get introspective around this time of year and realize I have a talent and shouldn't be squandering it. I'm not going to say I'm going to start cranking out pages right now. Especially right now with the holiday season upon me and dealing with both customers and family.

That being said, I'm going to start posting my manga that I have been working on for aeons and let it's eyes be shattered by the light of the world. I ultimately intend to post this stuff on Tokyopop as well in hopes of getting noticed there. I believe I'm good enough to pull that off.

I will post at a rate of one page per week. That should hopefully give me enough time to keep up a lead with all that is going on. Maybe after I feel I've built up a comfortable enough routine, I will ramp up the rate.

EDIT: After posting I realized I never presented a question as to give an opinion on as the post title leads one to believe. The question is... "Do you think it's a good idea to debut my manga content at Tokyopop or something more along the lines of DeviantArt?" I already have a DA page but haven't put my BY content on there yet. I can easily get a Tokyopop account in no time but wondered which would better the better place to reveal such a thing.

-Darrick

Still not the troll but HUZZAH!

I finally figured out how to work in Manga Studio Debut 3.0 with color. It's nothing elaborate because I was just trying to get the process down for the settings and layer orders I'd need to do them. It's small because the actual part was a piece of a bigger image that was whited out. Now I have the principles going, I can try to see what I can really do with that program.

-Darrick

I know I still owe the troll...

Hey! So I was trying to decide if I was going to use MSD (Manga Studio Debut) today and something told me to check their website out. So I did and turns out they are now on MSD 4.0. I have 3.0. I checked to see if it had an upgrade kit and it's only $20 so I will probably be doing that when I get my first check after I get back from GenCon.

Apparently Dave Gibbons who does Watchmen even uses MS-EX (what they don't mention is he has the EX version because he can spare $300).

-Darrick