"I'm sorry..."

I'm sorry...

Short version: Simply vent art.

Long version: I find myself saying that more and more to people, to the point that they are sick of hearing.  I've found myself saying it more now because whenever I talk to people all I feel is like I'm being annoying or irritating.  I can't help but feel like no one cares; I've lost so many friends that now it feels like that if I slip once more then there will be no one else.

Simply put, I've been feeling this lonely desolation for a while and I've been trying to get over it, and finally it came out onto paper.
Feel free to disregard the vent and appreciate it for arts sake.

Sketch - Rubicon Refit

I am not very good at designing or drawing ships, and yet I still try for some insane reason.

Today's posting is an idea that I really want to try and make work.
As I have mentioned before, in Star Trek Online my main character's ship is the USS Rubicon, an Avenger-class starship that is unique to STO. The ship design itself is good, but it's not 'perfect', shall we say. Normally I didn't let this bother me, but recently I found the Federation Starship Datalink and their article on the designing of the Enterprise-E, I was looking at the concept art for the ship and I found this one in particular.

The likeness between the concept art and the actual Avenger-class is...rather uncanny.

That's when I had this strange idea for a refit to the Rubicon, a new updated version of the Avenger-class that kind of combined the design ideas from both pictures.
The sketch is a first attempt that is..meh. It has some things that I do like, but it is -very- rough, so it's something to work on down the line I hope.

Sketch and Color - Illisandra

More progression work, this time with my character Illisandra.

This was another character concept that was born out of the Champions Online character builder. Inspired by some ideas I had seen in the game, I tried to create a kind of creature/draconic character, and Illisandra was the result.

Illisandra is a young draconic mage and very shy/timid; it's one reason why she wanted to learn magic, to try and become less timid and maybe become an adventurer someday and explore the world and maybe becoming a bigger part in it.
If I decide to have her specialize in a particular element, I'm not sure which one it'll be; I’m kind of leaning towards kinetic force or maybe something psionic since that was how I built her CO, but I'm not sure.

What I thought was amusing was that when I was working on her, she kind of made me think she belonged to the same school as another character a friend made; Lorica.

Her character is still being developed, so I don't have anything solid for her yet.

Sketch and Color - Shackles

It had been a while since I did anything really artful, so I decided to work on the new character 'Shackles' that I had posted the sketch of a while go, adding some color to him and working on his story, so I do apologize for the huge text wall here.

"Shackles" is a hybrid creature of both tauren and wolfen decent, a strange and unique heritage, however he never knew who his parents were, having spent most of his life by himself.

He grew up living mostly in the forest making a modest life for himself, not making a lot of contact with the nearby villages, preferring his idle life of solitude and exploring the forest.
However, he had no idea that he lived very close to a weak dimensional 'border'; a place where the normal world and the world of the Fey occasionally cross over each other, and one night he found himself in a very unfamiliar place, accidentally crossing over into the Feywild.
His arrival had not gone unnoticed and the creature found himself surrounded by all manner of fey creatures and the 'lord' of the area. Having no knowledge about creatures like this, he had no idea that speaking with the lord would lead him down a new path in his life; the silver-tongued fey lord managed to deceive and manipulate the hybrid into surrendering his freedom and willingly serve the fey lord and before he knew it, the deal had been sealed and with the passage back to the mortal world closed, the fey lord cast a spell on the creature, making him forget his real name and giving him a new name: Shackles.

The hybrid soon found himself in his new 'home': an elaborate manor hidden within the forests of the Feywild, and he was stuck as a slave to the fey lord and, regrettably, his apprentice; while "Shackles" was meant to tend to the fey lord's demands around the home, he also had to do the bidding of the apprentice.
In time, he found that the fey lord was not quite as terrible as he had feared and was rather kind to him, but the younger fey was far more malicious, often times forcing the slave to do some nasty tasks or performing 'experiments' on him along side 'pranks', forcing him to dance against his will or alter his voice to speak in some kind of gibberish. The slave was forced to enduring strange spells or potions being worked on him as well as the humiliation of the prankster's spells, but the effects were temporary, or so he thought.

One night the apprentice had a particular test in mind and he created a rather potent potion and had Shackles hold onto the bottle while he attempted to cast a spell on it, however the spell's power caused the bottle to rupture, spilling the contents all over the hybrid. The strange mixture had started to work on the 'residue' magic left on the hybrid, and because of the strange mixture of spells and effects he had suffered, the results were quite devastating. The hybrid could not control himself or the effects that were occurring around him that were caused by him: arcane sprays and elemental bolts shot out from him, strange effects were conjured up and his own body seemed to move against his will.
The sudden burst of magical energy in fact causes severe damage to the study and the fey lord himself had to conjure a set of magical shackles and locked them onto the hybrid: the effects stopped the random flow of energy so they wouldn't tear the the manor or  the hybrid apart.

"Shackles" had become a walking 'time bomb' of magical energy; because of their chaotic nature even the fey lord wasn't sure how to dispel it, which meant that the hybrid was forced to wear the shackles to keep the powers at bay.

The apprentice himself was punished for his carelessness and the lord sent him out on a task to pay back for the damages he caused, however, the apprentice never returned.
His fate remained a mystery until recently, when a new creature emerged; the apprentice had grown powerful and mad, with a strong intend on revenge and domination. The fey lord himself felt responsible for the serious turn of events but he was unsure of what he should do, until he remembered Shackles.

Now the fey lord began to work with him and, with the aid of the magical restraints, the hybrid was able to focus and channel the chaotic energies flowing through him, allowing him to perform acts that he thought he could never do. The bonds he was forced to wear now are the only things that can help him control these new found abilities.

There are dangers though, should the shackles be removed, the chaotic powers infecting him would be unleashed and no one knows what kind of devastation they would bring.

I actually owe a lot of thanks to AbramWinterSmith, he helped me come up with a lot of the ideas for his backstory since I really wasn't sure what direction I should take him in, and what I came up with was quiet the opposite of the initial idea that sparked his creation.
The idea of Shackles forgetting his name is kind of interesting: a lot of stories that involve creatures like the Fey hold a very important significance to knowing names; that's why the fey lord or the apprentice don't have names (not yet), and should Shackles discover what his name is again, who knows what kind of effect that would have.


The linework and colors were done in SAI; I spent a bit of time trying to figure out a different way to shade him, it's not perfect but it worked and I kind of like the soft look he ended up getting.

Since he was forced to live in the Feywild, I wanted to try and incorporate some of the designs and details of fey craftsmanship and such, so some of his clothing is meant to be decorated with swirling designs, and since the shackles are magical, I wanted to give them a different look and try to incorporate the idea that these were different and served a different purpose.

Overall, I'm very pleased with how he turned out in both his appearance and his story.  If I'm lucky, I may try and do something more with him here, we'll have to see.

Doodle - Displeased Dorgan is Displeased

Captain Dorgan demands an explanation for this bull-crap.

Just something small I did for myself: Captain Dorgan looking displeased.
Inspired by the pose of Riker from this comic cover.

Sketch and Color - Tumahab

Another art progression post (man, a third one in a row?)
This time I decided it was probably time to work on one of my darker characters: Tumahab.

Tumahab is Bahamut's doppelganger or 'Mirror Universe' version if you like, the "evil" Bahamut from another universe.
I don't know why but I've always found the idea of the "Mirror Universe" interesting, thinking of how creepy some of my characters would be if they were evil, so a while ago I sat down and gave some thought to how Tumahab would be and to be honest, Tumahab kinda of frightens me.

Tumahab is meant to be crafty and brutal, unforgiving, manipulative, treacherous and downright nasty. However, it is that he can be unrelenting and powerful that he has such a great number of followers, and it is incredible that he has a lot of trust in those closest and most loyal to him.
What makes him an even greater threat is that he has the ability to plan and predict his enemies, making him a bit of a genius when it comes to fighting people; something that is even scarier since he can outmatch Bahamut in that regard since he can predict how his 'better half' will react.

I worked on the sketch back in May, and I felt like that it was time to give him some color and some life, even if he does creep me out a little.
Many of the scars and markings on him are symbolic; some things that formed over the years. The marking on his arm though, I'm not too sure what that means quite yet; the last time I drew him that was always covered, so I thought it would be something interesting.

"You and I are two sides of the same coin..."

Sketch and Color - Bahamut Test

Another art progression post for today.

Decided to sit down and work on the sketch of Bahamut I was playing with a different look/style for him (I was inspired/influenced by the artwork of Tay over at DeviantART, so I was trying something different here with Bahamut, the most obvious is the kind of digitigrade feet/legs that he has only at rest).

Nothing too grand with this really, just added some color and a little bit of shading for him here. I was playing around with the shading here though, testing different tools in SAI and seeing what they could do.

The third image here though is a bit different. Nothing too grand, I just wanted to play around with a different color scheme for Bahamut.
I dunno why, but I always wondered how Bahamut would look in white, so I gave it a try here, altering some of his colors to see how it would look (I am kind of tempted to name him 'Hunter', since a lot of people end up calling me that when they see 'Hunter Bahamut').

Sketch and Color - Bowser Bahamut

A progression post for today, I decided to sit down and color Bowser Bahamut.

I never really liked the colors I had for the first time I tried this theme, so this time around I kept his colors more 'classic', and used the color scheme of Bahamut's feral form for him here.
I also wanted to try to keep the shading simple, only two tones like some of the promotional art I've seen for Bowser himself, but I swear I cannot make the shading smooth at all.

Character Sketch - Shackles

Okay...how to start with this guy...

For a while now I've had some thoughts about a character idea that I honestly didn't think would really go anywhere, but had slowly started to develop a little so I figured it was probably time to show him off here.
So, this fellow here is Shackles.

Right...so...

The first sketch was just a random doodle I worked on one night, it was meant to be an quick experiment in facial expressions, but the character reminded me of a another hybrid character that I had in an rp long-long ago (he was a kind of minotaur/wolf), so that got me thinking. With that and looking through skifi's dA gallery, I started getting ideas and some inspiration for the character and I decided to sit down and do some sketching and refine some ideas.

I have a basic idea for a story down for him but nothing really grand. I had the weird idea of the character having crossed into the Fey Realm by accident and he ends up getting caught and played with by some fey creatures who would end up locking the strange shackles on him, so he would have a way to remove them and get the creatures to leave him be.
Basic, but it's an idea.

As for the name...well, I dunno, for some reason I wanted to come up with a character to use that name and it seemed like a good and ironic name for him to have given his situation.

Not sure if I will do much with this guy though, we'll have to see.

Character Sketches - ITS Character Concepts

As some of you may recall, I am a fan of the world of the Intergalactic Truckstop, a comic created by Chaz-GELF, and I have created three fan characters set in that world; Jasper, Saar and Enigma.

Well...I have more.

Some time ago, I was wondering about a group that could exist in the ITS world, and I started to come up with ideas and concepts that could be fun to play around with, so here are some concept sketches for two more characters.

Firstly, there is Captain Adam Nebula, the human captain of the cruiser 'Atlantis'; mysterious cruiser that no one seems to know anything about. He is part of a four-person team that would like to call themselves mercenaries, but are pretty much a group that is willing to do almost anything to make money, whether it's hauling cargo or such. This means most of the time they're glorified cargo movers, but have taken the occasional dangerous mission.


Again, good practice at drawing humans, and I never developed a proper bald character before, so it was good practice.
Nebula is kind of an interesting character; back in the day when I started to use the internet and started role-playing I didn't really develop Dorgan or Bahamut, so I came up with the character name 'Christopher Nebula' for a sci-fi based character. Since Adam shares a lot of similarities, I decided to give him the Nebula name as well, kind of letting the name live on.

Next up is K'Ral, the Quargon gunman and weapons expert of the team.
K'Ral has been friends with Nebula since the beginning of their space-faring adventures, a Quargon that is very familiar with all manner of weapons (I kinda of think of him as the 'Garrus' of the group in a way). He has stayed with Nebula when they started up their business and has stuck with him through thick and thing. He loves getting a chance to tinker with the team's gear, but spends a good amount of his time with his own gear of the weapons on the ships. (Mmm...calibrations.)

It seems that when I come up with sci-fi themed teams, I always have one weapon's expert, and he's always a reptilian of some kind, so it was very appropriate for K'Ral to follow the same. He is based off another character of mine that worked off the original Nebula concept, so this really just works hand in hand.

Remember, all things related to the Intergalactic Truckstop is (c) Chaz-GELF.

Character Sketch - Bahamut Koopa Revisit

Back in the ancient mists of time, I had some fun drawing Bahamut in different forms, and one of those forms was a Koopa. Problem was that, even back then, I was never really happy with it. It was a fun idea, but I could have done better.

Well, since I made a revisit with Bahamut in his bat form, I decided to make a revisit of his Koopa-self, and here we are.

I am certainly happy with how this looks in the end, looks much more like a proper Koopa than I had done before. Though now I suppose the question now is, should I color it?

Character Sketch - Bahamut Test

From time to time, I like to take Bahamut and play around with his look and/or my style of drawing him or drawing in general. Well, today's sketch is something akin to that me playing around a bit.

I was heavily inspired/influenced by the artwork of Tay over at DeviantART, so I wanted to try something a little here with Bahamut, nothing too major, just getting some ideas out, the most obvious is the kind of digitigrade feet/legs that he has, only at rest.

This is...far from perfect obviously, but for some reason I kind of like how this turned out, it might be something to play around with later on down the line.

Character Sketches - Star Trek

I have to apologize to people for the lack of updates and art here, to be honest I've been suffering from a severe case of lack of motivation and self-esteem, but I have come back with some sketches, and here are three to make up for the past few days.

Although...they are Star Trek related, my apologizes.

First one here is pretty simple, Bahamut in a Starfleet uniform. I haven't been able to do a decent one of him like this, so I tried it again here. Actually looks partially decent, so it's something.

Second up is something kind of random, a concept for a character of an unknown alien race I had thought up. The initial concept sketch here though is...not very good in my opinion. It's very lacking in, well, design, detail and personality, so...it's a starting point but that's about it.

And lastly is just portrait shots of Dorgan and the new character. This was for some practice with human or human-like faces as well as seeing if I could do something for the new character, but again, kind of lacking for some reason.

At least it's something, if nothing else.

All things Star Trek are (c) to CBS, and the uniform designs are inspired by Star Trek Online, which is (c) Cryptic Studios.