Three Images, Two Drawings, One Character

More delays on the Mock Poster Essay, I'm afraid. I'd like to say you can't rush Art, but in truth you can rush Art. You can rush it lots. It just won't be worth much when it's done.

Worse comes to worse, I skip it for now and finish the Spam essay. Better than than a bad essay.

Instead of the promised essay, I thought I'd show how I've been improving in terms of drawing. What follows is character design for a protagonist who, as it happens, has nothing to do with the Mock Posters and the stories they try to represent

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This was drawn... I'm thinking three to four years ago. I'm only putting up this rough form as all my attempts to retouch it have ended in embarrassment. Still, nothing to be ashamed of here. One ear might be a little too high and the like, but still not bad.

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This (the same character) was drawn a month or so back. My scanner isn't functioning right now, so I've been using a digital camera. It makes the whole thing way too hazy, but what can you do?

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This is the finished picture, touched up and cleaned up with Jasc Paintshop. For the most part, I use Jasc to sort of "ink" my lines, as well as take out what specks the scanner (or in this case the camera) puts in. In this case, unless I'm misremebering things, I didn't "ink"; these are all the original lines

I try not to do a lot of cutting and pasting, to keep the "cheat" feeling down. However, in this case I did cut and paste several times. Still, it doesn't look to far gone from the original, does it?

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The last image is what I aspire to be capable of without Jasc's help, the middle image is where I'm at (which I think is damn close to target), and the first image wasn't appreciated when I did it.

All images the work of Cullen M. M. Waters

Where in the World is Cullen Waters?

At home, actually, fooling around with HTML. Because I know so little. For instance, today I learned about ^superscript. So now I can right first as 1^st and have it actually look like first. Hurrah!

Which will be useful, considering the number of times I need to use it.

Which is next to never.

Which is beside the point. Kind of.

I was planning on putting up the promised "Mock Poster Lessons". Beckoning Chasm, over at Crap and Garbage in Violent Opposition, has written up an excellent criticism on the posters which makes my handling the matter ever so much easier. I was eagerly looking forward to putting up an essay that was one post long...

And then I made the mistake of reading some political commentary on anther site. Now I'm a seething cloud of hatred. So when that passes, I hope to get things going again. Of course, whim might take me elsewhere.

Of all the places it will take me, political debate will never be a destination. For the record, I am firmly an Independent with a willingness to listen to either side of the political spectrum, provided that said side actually is making a point and not just carping on how evil/wrongheaded/stupid the other side is. Unfortunately, more often than not I feel like the animals at the end of Animal Farm: I look from one party to the next and see so little difference between the two. Both will claim to be looking out for the country's interests, both will point out the faults of the other party (valid or otherwise), but when it comes to their own faults it's nothing but excuses, double talk, and the ever popular "the other guy is doing this and that," as if what the other guy is doing excuses things.

The United States of America has it's problems internally and externally. And all of it's politicians are spending their time screaming "They did it! They did it!" while taking what they can get from the pockets of the tax payers.

And the capper on all of this is that I enjoy politics from a historical perspective as well as in a Fantastic one. The schemes, the maneuvering, all of it, just fascinating. In many ways it's better than watching Hero X take on Monster Y in full fledge battle.

It's just when it affects my life and the lives of my fellow humans that I tend to lose my fondness.

But I'm not going let whim make me talk about politics. No sir, not one word.

Yep.

Man of steel, that's me.

Pointless ranting (and no doubt naive political opinions) aside, I fully intend to get my thoughts up on the Mock Posters, finish my essay on the rash of spam attacks (now with amusing anecdote!), and work towards the end of my Inspiration series. And then who knows? More movie reviews? More prose? Poetry that isn't Haiku? More art work?

We shall see.

Assuming I can keep myself from reading political double talk between then and now...

Godzilla!

Boy, am I posting up a storm today, but I thought this picture was too good not to share. Now that's what I aspire towards.

Well, that and novelist. And Speed Racer, of course. Everybody wants to be as good as Speed Racer.

(Haiku of wide variety located below. In case anyone cares...)

The Smurf Haiku

Gargamel:

Tiny blue and white streaks

dart 'cross my lawn, taunting me

How I hate them all!

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Azrael:

Meow meow mur

Raow meow pft pft pft

Mur meow purr purr!

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Haiku Smurf:

Run through the tall grass

Listen to him howl and smurf

He'll never catch us

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Gargamel:

Squirming in my grasp

Shocked look upon his small face

Sadly just a dream

The Cthulhu Haiku

His dreams stir the night

Poets tremble, mountains moan

and Death dreams of Death

Or

Troubled nights come

Forgotten island appears

dead Cthulhu waits

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These two are inspired by Call of Cthulhu, obviously. The first I took a further bit of inspiration from the couplet:

That is not dead which can eternal lie,
And with strange aeons even death may die.

The second, this single sentence, "In his house at R'lyeh dead Cthulhu waits dreaming."

If Call isn't Lovecraft's best, then it's damn close. Despite the rather silly end.

The Raven Haiku

His shadow enshrouds

my feeble soul, smothering

me forevermore

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The impish, foolish part of me gloats that I have done in three lines what took Poe dozens to say. But the wise part of me makes sure Poe's Poem is nowhere near for me to compare with...

My Cousin Emily

Beyond the Little Brothers Eric and Jason Todd, I seldom talk about family at any great length (and even they don't get that much space.) Not that my family isn't important to me, or that they aren't worth talking about. It's just that the Blog wasn't really intended for that much biographic or day-to-day stuff. With Ego Boost Week alone I've done more yaking about myself than I really intended.

However, for this entry I intend to speak of my cousin Emily.

Emily is a good, kind girl twelve years younger than myself who is very much the little sister I never had. And I treat her as such whenever and as often as I can.

Which is another way of saying that I'm mean to her.

Very, very mean.

She takes my cruelty with good grace more often than not. I often hope she sees me as the big brother she never wanted or needed. Sometimes I vow to her that I will be nicer, kinder, or, at the very least, silent. She knows full well, however, that this is a promise I will not keep. There is something about teasing her that I just can't resist.

What she doesn't realize, of course, is that in all truth I am quite sweet towards her. The aforementioned Little Brothers could tell Emily horror stories about the absolute depths I can sink to. They never will, however, as I have dirt on how far they can sink.

Blackmail can work for you, too, he snickers.

Anyways, part of the reason I introduce my cousin Emily to this blog because, well, I introduced her to this blog. I gave her the address and told her that any time she thought I was oh too mean to her innocent self, she could come here and Tell All. I figure I have nothing here THAT offensive to read (unlike, say, at least one of my brothers). Hell, my mom reads my site on a regular basis. How bad could it be?

If Emily does come telling tales, in all odds what she says is going to be true. I'm fairly terrible towards her and should treat her better. Well, at least a wee bit better. Maybe.

I don't expect her to show up here, however. I expect her to take the page I wrote my blog address down on and throw it away. She's really got more important things to do with her life. She's studying to be a nurse, and I am positive she'll be a good one, even though I might tell her that I'm going to move to another state rather than risk having her treat me.

If she does show... Well, see, that's the other reason I'm writing this. I hope that she sees the title of this post and think, even if for only a moment, "What did he say about me?"

Told you I was mean to her.