Online Comics: DOGs of WAR: Chapter 1 (post no. 004)

DOGs of WAR: Chapter 1 (Post no. 004)

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Art & Story: Xia Taptara
Creative Editing: Skylark

Creator Note:
I usually go to work at Arena around 6:00 am. I can get a lot done when nobody is around. I can also use about half an hour writing my blog. This morning I walked in to my office and WOW. There is a brand new computer on my desk! It's a quad-core system with tons of advance technology stuff on it. It's a KILLER machine because we are stepping up for GUILD WARS 2!!! Anyway, I turn it on. I cannot find a single program that works yet. Photo Shop is not install, Maya, Max, etc. Nobody is around, so I am trying to figure out everything myself. I can just go to the network drive and get those program and install it. But I couldn't find a network drive. Well there are actually about four or five at Arena, there is this particular one that I need, I couldn't find it. And oh! now we have Vista (which I don't really like it much, my girlfriend got it since it was pretty buggy so I had a bad experience with it, I love Google desktop and package better. I don't really know who copy who. Anyway, now I am posting this on my laptop.
There were suppose to be two panels today, but the other one require a balloon text which I thought I would quickly do it at work early, but since Photo Shop isn't there, I will have to find the way to install it today.

I am still enjoying Dogs of War so far, I hope you guys are enjoying it. I also got some feedback from readers
  • that I should make the text within the panel bigger and darker so it's easy to read.
That will be fixed, thanks so much for your feedback.
Also feel free to correct my grammatical error on each post. Let me know where to edit them, you guys can be public editors or something.

If you have any feedback, comment or idea about how to make this Online comics better or even my blog as a whole. Feel free to let me know and leave the comment on the BLOG! That's what it is for. It's like a NAKED CONVERSATION and we both communicate. You and ME! So it's great!!! Let me hear what you think.

Thanks for visiting
Peace!!!

Online Comics: DOGs of WAR: Chapter 1

DOGs of WAR: Chapter 1 (Posted no.3)

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Adela, like Hazah, is one of Captain Huang's best men. Not only she has beautiful sharp feature, long dark hair and hazel/green eyes but she can also be deadly. Her origin is unknown but she resemble those of Slavic family. She's been riding with the Mongol since the age of four. Alone and lost child during the war time, the Mongol took her in. Now she is eighteen, but don't be fool by her ages. She's a skillful short range weaponary and dagger master. The Mongol tough her everything she needs to know about survival and now she's becoming one of the best among the best of the horde.


Creator NOTE:
It's fun to do this series, I will keep it going as long as I can. I actually just finish plotting (scripting) its chapter 2 last night. So we'll see if I can keep up the art and stuff. I am always intrigued by how the Mongol came into power by Genghis Khan. I read tons of books about it and there are so many theory and such. Some even say that he has gray eyes (don't really know how true that is). I am sure he might have some nomadic/ central Asian blood in him but who really knows. Anyway, I really enjoy working on these and hope you will enjoy the story and art as well.

Chaos!

Online Comics: "DOGS OF WAR": chapter 1

"DOGS OF WAR": chapter 1 (post no.002)

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Online Comics: DOGs of WAR. post no.001

DOGs of WAR: chapter 1
"BATTLE OF SAMARA BEND"
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Samara Bend (pre battle): Kernek, Volga Bulgaria: 1223 AD

In 1223, after defeating Russian and Kipchak armies at the Battle of Kalka, a Mongol army under the command of Subutai and Jebe was sent to subdue Volga Bulgaria. At that point in history Genghis Khan's troops were seen as invincible.


khan, mongol, online comic, comic, comics, xia taptara, genghis, dogs of war, knight, warrior




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*NOTE: Subedei and Jebei are two of the greatest generals of Genghis Khan.They played considerable roles the practicalities of the war, using a hands-on approach. These generals were purely chosen as part of a meritocracy, as none of them were from the direct family line of Genghis. Genghis Khan did not as a general rule trust his relatives to command large number of troops for larger campaigns, and so he did not allow them to command significant numbers of soldiers.*

**NOTE: When integrating new soldiers into the army, Genghis Khan divided the soldiers under different leaders to break up the social and tribal connections, so that there was no division based on heritage of tribal alliances. In all campaigns, the soldiers took their families along with them for the battle. Promotion was based only on merit. Each unit leader was responsible for the preparedness of his soldiers at any time and would be replaced if this was found lacking


***NOTE:
In terms of battle detail, a Mongol army leader during battle might be anywhere in the formation and would use flags and horns to order his strategies during the battle. To the Mongols, victory seemed to matter most, and they couldn't afford to lose battles nor men because they were poor in logistics and had few spare troops (at best half as many soldiers in almost all major battles than their enemies, and travelling far away from their homeland). The rules of engagement were clear under Genghis Khan. For example, if two or more soldiers broke away from their group without their leader's approval, they would be put to death.

Creator Note
:

I decided to drop the Comics: "Mei and Pupie" (Shanghai Express) because I wrote it long time along and honestly I didn't feel any connection with that story in the moment. Without connection, I am afraid I could not illustrated it well enough to make it near what it could have been. Anyway, I decided to pick up "DOGs of WAR" because I am currently with it. I had a idea and wrote the plot not too long ago so I am still attach to it and the connection is still there. I am still excited every time I am thinking about what is going to happen next. So...here it is. It is an ambitious project and I hope to continue doing it on a regular basis until at least I finished the first chapter. We'll see, I am very busy as it is. I just got myself into more trouble.

Chaos!

Panel OF DOOM Report: AWA 2007

This year's AWA was the first time I ever missed Totally Lame Anime and Anime Hell save for about 15 minutes from each of them. I'm kind of down on that, but it was nice to see that (from what I'd seen) the execution has become slightly closer to my approach. The laptop dualview setup works great as a modern-day replacement for the trusty multiple VCR setup since I can still add to, remove from, and rearrange things on the fly as clips are playing without anyone seeing what's going on, with the highly important benefit of not having to carry around a giant box of tapes. Plus, I don't have to navigate through menus or swap things out, so it makes everything more rapid-fire.

Last year, I didn't bring the proper cable so the entire panel was in black and white due to my stubborn insistence of not using the VGA computer cable on account of having had bad luck with it in the past. This year, I had the proper S-Video to composite adapter, but compared to VGA it looked a bit blurry. Maybe it was the projector itself, which seemed to be set up such that the color red would just bleed a whole lot. Provided that the laptop is the only input device in use and I'm not switching to another VCR or DVD player, perhaps I should consider giving the VGA cable another shot.

Not that any of that boring tech stuff mattered since this was the BEST PANEL OF DOOM! EVER. Following a well-known expose regarding the threat of the Internet terrorist group "Anonymous" blowing up school buses, the proceedings kicked off with a Japanese commercial for Mandom (cologne?) featuring Charles Bronson prancing around shirtless. And firing pistols. I know a thing or two about firing pistols, but this year marked the debut of the Clown Submachinegun:



A full playlist will be posted somewhere soon, but for now, the part that everyone is waiting for:


GARBAGE DAY!

Speedpainting Environment : "Mountain"

Once in a blue moon I will do environment, I should do more. It's just purely for practice purpose. So I can see how the color, value and light interact with one another. It's a quick painting just to get the value, composition and depth right. Even if it's not my cup of tea at the moment I still enjoy it once in a while. Though I am thinking if I am better at it, I probably like it a lot more. But my philosophy is "practice makes perfect", I would probably do more.

Sorry guys, no girl today yet.

Have a great Monday!
*back to work* : )

Another old Oil Painting, and some figure sketches.

Not much today, just an old oil painting (three hours) and some figure sketches from life.
Thanks for stopping by, have a great weekend. *back to work on comics*



How to draw Anime Girl Face.

How to draw Anime & Manga Face: Girl Step by Step tutorial

There are two methods in this post, pick which ever one you prefer. Both works!

Here is Method#1

Here is a drawing for Anime girl frontal shot. And now I am going to explain how I sketch step by step. I will try to make this one as easy and simple drawing as possible. Easy tutorial!

How to draw Anime, girl, manga, Face, Step by Step tutorial

Let's begin!
1) I start with an circle shape drawing (but imagine it's a sphere), very old school and traditional and it quick for me. On this one I am going to draw a frontal shot. (I lways attach the neck and a bit of shoulder with the head when doing face but this time we'll start of just the head)
2) Then I add a triangle shape in middle of the bottom to make a chin.
3) Then draw a horizontal line to divide the circle in half. This horizontal line would be where humans eyes should be, they are usually right in the middle of the face horizontally. And the vertical line that where the nose and lips should line up in relation to the face.
How to draw Anime, girl, manga, Face, tutorial

4) Following the marks I made. I draw the eyes and eyebrows, I then also make a mark for nose and mouth. The nose should be place half way in between the horizontal line and the bottom edge line of the circle. The mouth usually half way between the nose and chin (mostly in anime, in reality it could also be measure.)

5) After I have all the important facial feature mark, I go in and tighten up the line drawing. Also I add in her relatively large pupils.

6) At this stage I begin to draw hair line starting from her forehead.

How to draw Anime, girl, manga, Face, tutorial

7)- 8) Continue the hairline to frame her face. When do the anime or manga hair, make it simple, simplify big clump of hair and make if jaggy (I might do a tutorial on this later.)

9) The top of the head should be additional half a circle tall, measure from the top of the existing circle.

How to draw Anime, girl, manga, Face, tutorial

10) Almost there! at this stage, I just look at the overall proportion and check if it's ok to finalize the sketch then I add a slim neck and shoulder.

11) It looks ok, then I clean up the construction lines. Done! Now you have anime or manga face sketch. From here, you could tighten up the drawing more or you can go into coloring you Anime face in Photoshop or whatever you prefer.

How to draw Anime, girl, manga, Face, tutorial

How to draw Anime, girl, manga, Face, Step by Step tutorial

You might also be interested in more Anime Face Tutorials:

-"How to draw anime Girl Face: Side View

-"How to draw anime Girl Face: 3/4 Front"
OR
-"How to draw Girl face, realistic"

Hope this is helpful to you!

Here is Method#2

#2 Tutorial


Hi fellas,

Here is another tutorial on face. How to draw Anime Girl's face! That's a general term people use, I would call it a stylistic face. In my opinion, you should be able to construct a correct realistic facial proportion first then go from there to explore how would you exaggerate or caricature a facial feature in specific way. If you start to draw in particular style first, then it is difficult for you to change the way you draw. If you start from classical realistic feature, you will understand it from the foundation level and you can expand to variety of style. It is you who has the power to choose. Without foundation, it is hard to transition. So...I will show you a quick tutorial of how to draw an Anime Style face from a realistic structure.


First take a look at the first 5 steps of my previous "How to draw face" tutorial.

1) I start with an egg shape drawing, very old school and traditional and it quick for me. On this one I am going to angle it a bit so the face will be 3/4 instead of the frontal shot. Always attach the neck and a bit of shoulder with the head when doing face, it gives you more of an illusion of this is part of a person. When you see an illusion of this is a part of a person, you will do a better job filling the rest in, instead of just an outline of egg shape or oval.
2) Imagine a front surface of an egg, think in three dimension, then draw a vertical line to split it in half from top to bottom. Then draw a horizontal line to divide the top and bottom distance in half. This horizontal line would be where humans eyes should be, they are usually right in the middle of the face horizontally. But most of the time we don't really see that because our hair deceives us.
3) I add two more horizontal line on top and bottom of the existing one. These line will help me indicate how tall should the eyes be in comparison to the rest of the face. I also make the mark on the right side of the head where the top part of her ear should be.
Another mark for the bottom of her nose, it is half way in between the first horizontal line and the bottom of her chin. And again in between the nose mark and the bottom of the chin half way should be where her mouth is.
The last mark on this one is for ear lobe, it should be a bit above the nose mark.
4) Following the marks I made. I draw the eyes, it should no be taller than the distance of the top and bottom horizontal lines that I added on to the first horizontal (With exception of some style such as Disney and Manga which I might later on make a tutorial for it, but I will stick to the normal or close to normal proportion for now). Notice, I draw the corner of both eyes in relation to the first eye's indication line. Also the distance between the two eyes should equal one eye. So when you draw, imagine there is an invisible eye in between them. Then I begin to draw the nose, notice that I did not draw the whole nose. Why? Because in reality when you see the whole nose you tempt to draw the whole nose as you see. But if you paint a lot or draw a lot from life (especially in painting). You will notice, from squinting to find value in painting or rendering, that the value of the physical nose compare to the rest of the face is not at its darkest value to be able to put them in line drawing. If you were to draw a simple face which using black or darkest value to define the line drawing. The only part of the nose that should appear in line drawing should only be the bottom of the nose. Because that's where it casts the shadow as strong as a person eyes' line, eyelashes, and lips. (Make sense?) Then I finish this one off with the upper lips.
5) Now I add in eyebrows, the head of the eyebrow be about the same distance as the eye's corner horizontally (Unless you want to make your girl looks uni-brow), but the tail can be longer. Then I add a line to suggest her lower lip.
And from there, you have the foundation of the feature. Now, we will stylize it into Anime girl.
- (Option B) Or you can continue to the normal facial structure tutorial-->>HERE

6) Start from her eyes, you have to exaggerate the eye's proportion into 2 or 3 times normal size (think of a baby or cute little kid facial feature.). Then you add in extra large pupils.
7) Place her nose where it is suppose to be but stylize it into a 2D panel, making an 'L' shape drawing. Adding mouth, it has to be expressive a bit. (You can include her lips or not, it is up to you. But traditionally, they have no lips feature.)

8) At this point, you add eyebrows where is suppose to be. It should be a bit above normal range of normal facial structure. Basically, Anime or Disney have something in common which they try to babifying the face to make it more appealing to wider audiance.

9) Now you can draw the outline of the face. Typically you shorten the length of the chin, and from the cheek to the tip of the chin is short and puffier. Imaging it as if you squeeze the normal facial structure together. Then the angel from the cheeks to the bottom of the chin is a bit more drastic, but with puffy convect curve.

10) Now I clean up the construction line. Then slim down or stylize the neck and shoulder to be more like cartoon. (Once you draw tons and tons of faces, you will need less and less construction line to begin your drawing.)

11) Clean up...

12) Now I draw hair shape over her skull, then clean up the skull line.

13) At this stage, I can apply simple color on her skin and hair. (You can use Overlay Layer in Photo Shop. or paint over.)

14) Now I go in and assign color for her eyes.


15) Then I assign darker value of skin and hair over on the right hand side (her left). (You can use Multiply Layer to in Photo Shop or pick darker value and paint over.) Then I use a little bit of lighter value color to assign the light over her frontal area of her hair, tip of her nose, and highlight of her eyes.

Done! This are all quick basic instruction, nothing fancy. You can still take it as far as you like.
Hopefully, this will help you kids or anyone interested alike.


Want to see more "How to draw a Girl's Face" Tutorial: -->> HERE
More Manga or Anime girl Video Tutotials:-->>HERE

Now go find yourself a life drawing session near you and practice! You will find it a lot more valuable than any tutorial in the world. Nothing is better than drawing from a live model.
Salut!

Life Drawing

Here are some life drawing sketches. The first one, I spend probably 20 minutes total and the last two is three to five minutes.

Practice how to draw or drawing from nude life model is the best way to learn how to draw figure and real people anatomy because you only get certain amount of time to do it. You have to make quick accurate decision of where to start, what next and how to accomplish what you want in limited time period. You get to see muscle group move from place and how it form in certain position. It will make you a better artist fast and it will challenge you every time you do it.

I was actually going to post comics panel today, but eventually it didn't happen as I plan. Sometimes very soon, it will be here just don't know when.



Have fun guys!

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Guild Wars: Girls Fan Art

Since we are done with Guild Wars and now we are moving on to the new generation (GW 2), I thought I might revisit and do something fun with some of the old character that I designed. Sometimes, it's useful and refreshing looking at older work and rethink and evaluate yourself as an artist. Can I call it "Fan Art"?

The guys over here at ArenaNet are trying very hard to find the newest MMO technology for GW2. As for the Art team, we are very excited about the project as if it was a brand new project. We are trying to reinvent everything, but we want to still feel that wow, this is THE GuildWar IP. Daniel Dociu (The Man, Art director) and the concept team come up with lots and lots of very visually stunning. I can't wait to see what they would look like on screen. I love the team over here at ArenaNet, they are over the top. Anyway, ...here is art!

Another quick Scribble:

Also like I said there is one more great tutorial from "Mattias Snygg" I found. They are top knot!!! I put it on my links on the right hand side. Thanks for stopping by and have fun!

And if I could find some time this week, I could do another "how to draw girl" tutorial gain.
Cheers!

Funny stuff in St. Petersberg.

Hey Fellas!

I just got this funny video from my girlfriend (the brunette in video). They were in St. Perterberg visiting their friend and family. Then they somehow manage to break something in their bathroom (in Europe, bathroom and toilet are set into separate rooms). So every time they takes bath, doing laundry, or doing something with water, it leaks onto their neighbors downstairs. So this is how them girls manage to solve their problem so it doesn't leak to the neighbor.

It doesn't make sense to me, but it looks funny so I thought I would share it with you guys and girls. I know it's silly, but that's just me.

PS: Yes I am still doing art. and ART is coming soon...today

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Girl Spinning: which way do you see?



This image has tripped everyone out at my work. Why? You have to stare at it for a while.
Most people will see it spins counterclockwise because they are trying to rationalize it or they are usually in the logical daily routine mode. You can also see it spin clockwise when you are relaxing and let you right brain do the work.

I first saw it clockwise then for a while I stare then I see it counterclockwise when I was trying to analyze what I see. Try it, it's cool!


"The left brain is considered analytic in approach while the right is described as holistic or global. A successive processor (left brain) prefers to learn in a step-by-step sequential format, beginning with details leading to a conceptual understanding of a skill. A simultaneous processor ( right brain) prefers to learn beginning with the general concept and then going on to specifics."

LEFT: (Anylytic)
  • Verbal
  • Response toward meaning
  • Sequential
  • Process information linearly
  • Response to logic
  • Plans Ahead
  • Recalls peoples name.
  • Speak with no or less gesture
  • Punctual
RIGHT: (Instinctive)
  • Visual
  • Responds to tone of voice
  • Random
  • Process information in varied order
  • Responds to emotion
  • Impulsive
  • Recalls people's faces
  • Gesture when speaking
  • Less Punctual

How to draw a girl figure: Quick Video painting tutorial

Hello again ladies and gents,

This is basically a video tutorial of How to draw or paint a girl figure in action shot. But then I mix and match a little conceptual idea here and there to spice it up.

This one I just start out for fun, just another excuse to draw girl. I had some kind of action shot in mind but with out foreshortening. Because I just want to practice painting skin, anatomy and style. This one took me a bit longer than I thought (a few hours, it's getting harder to find more time to do more art since my girlfriend's already back from a vacation. But I will fight for it, this is what I do!). Anyhow, in the first version, she is totally naked for no good reason, except my own. So I thought I should dress her up a little bit more like PG13. I am still afraid to go too overboard since I am blogging and I never know if there will be any young audience.

In my opinion, which I have none so I don't know. I don't really judge, I am just trying to art in Photo Shop.

Here it goes, another squibbee! (PG 13)

"Click Here for rated R Version"

Here is also a YouTube feed of how it is done, just for the hell of it (Why not?) (I might write a step by step tutorial for this one later, who knows) It shows you in quick scope of how to paint a girl's figure.




Well, enjoy the great rest of the day,

Salut!

How to draw and paint in Photoshop: Step by Step and VideoTutorials.

Cool stuff today!
I've add additional thumbnail for "Label": Girls section on top of the blog so you can just browse the thumbnail visually instead of guessing from just topic description. It's a lot easier to find what you are looking for.

Also another addition Section add on the right side of the blog. These are very informative and very useful tutorial from other artists. And these guys are super good!!! I will keep adding them up as I find them, I am sure there are plenty more.

These are some great tutorials on How do create environment concept art from Goro Fujita and How to design a character or How to do character design in digital painting from Baron Tieri (I don't know his real name.)



Anyway, I will be back to blog my daily routine as usual, but for now I just want to keep you subscribers inform of what is news! And what will be coming up.
Have fun!

Sketches (more like scribble) from Sketch Book

Hey Fellas,

First off, thanks for visiting the site and hopefully I contribute something good to the society. Anyway, I am trying really hard to maintain my daily post. It's difficult to get GOOD New material everyday, but I still try. I wish I am a lot faster than I am so that I can crank out something in twenty minutes and it still look good as if I spend hours on it. Just a wish. :)

Today I scanned in some of my sketches, they are usually very loose because I just like to get the idea then I leave it. Then I scan them in and work on it digitally. Once in a while I will finish a sketch as far as I can for practicing purpose. To me, personally, I prefer taking them in to Photo Shop and finish painting them, it takes me about the same amount of time trying to finish rendering them with traditional graphite tool. That's what I love about digital age, you turn it on...then you good to go, you can save it then leave without having to clean up or try to find the way to save some paint. Also you don't really have to spend time to mix paint, prep material and all that. Though I still love painting in oil, there is nothing like it. Just that whenever I have at least four to five hours straight to spare, which is almost impossible for me nowadays.

Anyway, these are some sketches from my sketch book. I have two sets of books, one is purely for imagination and the other set is solely for life drawing purpose. These ones I did are mostly when I am really sleepy...I did them on purpose to get some kind of dreamy like in my head and try to cultivate them onto the book.
Some giant creature is trying to eat a girl.

Some thumbnails of mech idea I have in my head at times.

Some sleepy crap...I have no idea what those are, really.


"Super Girl" my version, a bit feisty.

Here are some sketches from life all of these are done in one to three minutes. Fun stuff!

*Note: it's art, and pure natural state that everyone possesses so there is no reason to freak out about seeing these for any reason (some people might have different perspective.). We study them, us so that we can make a better and brighter future for mankind, relax.

Thanks for visiting guys,
Have a great day!