Been studying composition.

And while I've been doing that I've been reflecting a lot on what makes a successful painting. I've decided that for most of my life I've been so enamored of the works of the masters but completely ignorant of the lessons that are right there in front of me. I can't believe I've gone this long and looked at as many works as I have and not really understood what I was missing until now. It sucks that I'm learning it this late. But I suppose its better than being forever ignorant.

This was more an excersize than anything else. I don't really think its anything that remarkable. But the point is that I have to start somewhere. I just did this to see if I'm truly absorbing the things that I'm reading. it all seems so simple reading it. But its actually putting it into practice that's the really difficult. As Osho said, you can think and think and think all you want about hitting the ball and then get up to bat and freeze.

I don't want to freeze.

More on Bella

Thought more on this magic thing while I was at work today. This whole "Bella just can't handle it" stuff. Also noted how insecure it was of me to make such a super powerful character, but that's another discussion. I don't consider her a super power anymore, anyhow. I think that Bella cannot emotionally take the stress, and is not smart enough to actually handle it correctly.

When you think about it, Magic bends the laws of the universe. We, living things, exist in between matter and time. Those that use magic deal with a force that makes possible the manipulation and breaking of both. Intelligent beings aren't emotionless computers, while not always logical, they always see the world a certain way. Mortality is limiting, the knowledge of the universe cannot be comprehended by a being that has a sense of self. A being with a sense of self sees only how the world relates to itself. Sees itself inside the world. It is the capsule that contains the mind's own smaller universe and is, by its very nature, restricting. When a caster uses magic, the wand acts as a conduit, allowing the user to manipulate magic without having to come into direct contact with the energies itself. The mind can focus on it while still having the safety of distance. You don't have to think too hard about it. You don't feel it draining the heat from your body like the very vacuum of space. What is different about Bella is that when she casts, she does. She feels it in her, through her, around her. When she casts she knows it with the intimacy of a lover, her mind has no place to escape. It can only look on and be overwhelmed. Such a fragile person stands no chance. Think of it as holding in your hands a screaming shaft of lightning. So powerful, unpredictable and potentially devastating.

The original Bella was a test tube baby. Coming out full grown with no childhood. This has since been dropped. The circumstances leading up to her birth have become more clandestine. She was born naturally, conceived on purpose to be used as a tool. Her mother chosen carefully before being abducted, raped, and forced to bear her. Only minutes after taking her first breath, she was given a dose of a syrupy, dark substance meant to 'align her poles' so to speak. To create 'pathways' through her body that aid in the conducting of magical energy. To remove 'friction' in the same way that a finely crafted wand does. At the base of her neck, her shoulders, hips, elbows, knees and the ends of each of her middle fingers were implanted with tiny obsidian and silver beads to aid in her conductive power. This process stressed the child incredibly. As a result Bella was a sickly baby.

Try as they did to make a perfect caster, Bella quickly fell short of their expectations and the project was eventually abandoned. Bella grew up a troubled and lonely person and while possessing the ability she does, she dreads and fears it like one would fear drowning in blood. She is by no means a noble person, or more capable of being a hero than anyone else is. Her mortality holds her back from her power, just as it would anyone else.

A means in which to distract myself.

The more depressing certain situations in the place I reside get, the more I retreat into the world in which I have created for myself. Pretty recently I've been letting it all bleed into this imaginary place. The more I look at it the grimmer it becomes. But I focus on it anyway, because at least a world of imagined darkness is better than the reality of what I face everyday.

I will finish this eventually. I like it well enough and its supposed to be something for Nat's DA page. You know its really hilarious how dark this character is in the story. Its comforting to have complete control over something. I know these ideas are not new in the slightest. But I can't help but talk about it sometimes.

So, back to the world that I have some semblance of control in; I've been thinking a lot of the character Bella. When I started with her she was an ill-developed DnD character and since has evolved into something else entirely. But seeing as she was a talented sorcerer in DnD... I was wondering if that quality should remain in flawed form or if I should get rid of it entirely.

In this setting, there is magic. Magic is an unknown and volatile force. It is something that the mind that knows the boundaries cannot understand. A mortal mind that comes in contact with it directly would simply go insane. That is why Magicians and Wizards and any magic user in general uses a wand or an artifact to channel magic. It is not there to aid you in having access to it even though this is what most magic users in the setting believe. That is what the chants and the evocations are for. The Wands and trinkets protect you from it. Using magic without them is to channel it through yourself. Exposing your body and mind to something that it is entirely not equipped to deal with. Whats more, an wand/trinket/artifact needs to be prepared in a sufficient manner in order to protect you. Some are better able to handle casting than others. This is why it is imperative that you acquire quality items and why casters go through so much trouble search all corners of the world for that one thing that will let them throw the big spells without turning their mind into tapioca.

 So what's Bella's problem?

Bella is a beautiful, wise but painfully simple girl. Though cunning, it is the kind of intelligence of a person forced to live as a scavenger most of their life has. In Bella's world there are important things that hold her in place and anything threatening those can send her quite easily into turmoil. She is damaged by emotional tramua and to compound this she has a great deal of trouble understanding the complex spells her husband uses so frequently. She is just not smart enough to cast magic the way most who practice it do.

The problem is, she can cast magic intuitively. She doesn't NEED the long spells and the magic circles to get by and while she could technically use them she doesn't have the mental facilities to work them. So whenever she does uses magic, she has to expose herself to it directly. Even for the briefest seconds glimpsing the 'rules' of the universe being bent by this inexplicable thing drives her to the brink of madness.

So she doesn't do it.

Still have a lot to think about. Can't really use it if it doesn't have a place in the story. Have to go to work now.

Choice Doodles from last year's Art Slam.

Last year I had the privilege of participating in an event called Art Slam on Live Journal. Its practically the only reason my journal there still exists, but essentially its a draw-a-thon. At the start you pick a project. Everyday, you do concepts for that project. I, of course, chose Protei. Protei is the name of the comic Nat and I eventually intend to create. Its about two of our favorite subjects, love and monsters. So you can bet your bosom we're just shivering with excitement to unleash it upon the world. Anyway...
 

  Starting it was pretty much a given as soon as I started combining the characters into the same setting. It was originally all Nat's. But together we gradually add onto it and come up with ideas, backgrounds, what the nations are like, what the history is. All before we actually embark on trying to tell the story.

The story itself is slightly complicated. There are numerous characters and each one has a story. Some are more defined than others. But the aim of every author is to come out the end of the process with a work that his meaningful and has to it a grace and flow. I think our aim to achieve this goal is mutual. That fact alone has likely contributed a lot to our persistence.

Designing the characters was never hard. Most of them had been with us for a long time, even before we met each other. It was when we came together on the project that the changes began to be made. In order to tell a compelling story with compelling characters... you have to take yourself out of them. I mean, yes, you are your characters. But I think that... there has to be room for the reader to put themselves in. As has been hammered into me since high school, something the reader relates to about the character that creates a bond.

By no means am I saying that we've reached this point at all with these characters, as every last one of them is still 'our baby'. But I state it because it is an end I hope to achieve, and by saying it out loud I hope to in the end guide us down that path.

Story or characters? Which is more important in the end? I think that I find that, unlike art. The subject of the story tends to be more important than the story itself. The same can not be said for a painting... which most likely depends on its compositional strength i.e. "The story" than it does the actual subject.

But I suppose that in both subjects there is a delicate line. And once the rules are established they can be broken and twisted to one's desire. Once I thought I fully understood the concepts of both. How to construct both a painting and a fine piece of literature. Learning has only taught me how little I know. It is both a humbling and invigorating feeling.

Back to Protei, there is still a lot of work to be done. A lot of bases to cover. And possibly a lot of fun to be had before we'll both be able to sit down on this project and really bring it to life. Mediocrity never served anyone any good. And I certainly don't want our story to end up as another one of those comics "with potential".

 

Its hard, especially for a massive undertaking like this to start painting and drawing the things that you are just not used to doing. Discipline, I've been told, is the only true way to overcome it. But I guess its only natural to complain at first.

 

Thank you for taking the time to read. Sorry again about there not being much.

WIPs

Several pieces that I'm actually still working on currently/may never finish. Just here because they ought to be up somewhere.

Both of these I eventually intend to finish. But since I'm addicted to blogging now I figured HEY WHY NOT?!

Also, right now I'm reading Donald W. Graham's classic textbook on composition. A textbook, the whole thing. It was so crisp and clean and brand new when I got it and then I got a little water on it and though the book is fine there is this crinkle in the pages and its driving me CRAZY.

Great book, though, great book. Its really amazing how I've been looking at my pictures up until this point. I really think this book is going to change how I see pictures forever... but we'll wait and see what the rest of the damn thing holds. Only 30 pages in... there's about 400.

Sketching.

Its a healthy habit normally. But up until very recently, sketching was really all I did. I never finished pictures beyond the sketching stage. I never created anything final, worthwhile maybe but never polished. Its a deeply rooted trait linked into my personality. I notice in my self the tendency to not want to make a final decision. To keep my options open for as long as possible. To finish a picture is to cement it. To lock its possibilities away. To finish something is to actually make a statement; something I almost never do too loudly. Its the same way with the way I operate in life. Big choices are pained and deliberated on forever until I can reach some kind of inner ultimatum. Is this normal? Or am I strange? Do I sound like an idiot or is there some wisdom in what I'm saying? I don't know.

I can't make up my mind.

I never thought I'd end up this way...

I was hoping that by 20 years I'd be halfway through my Bachelor's Degree for Art. Its been a long time since I was in college. And the longer I spend away from it the dimmer the hope of returning grows. Ah well, I say to myself. I'm going to try. In the mean time I'm going to take what I can get. Been studying on my own.

 

Some of my most recent work. I've noticed a change in my stuff lately, hopefully its for the best. For reference, here's some older work:

First post and all that.

I'm watching Twin Peaks while simultaneously posting this. Its funny that so many of the characters in that series remind me of the characters in the project of the setting I share with my friend. I'm making this at the behest of my mom. Though the things I post here might mostly be for the comic we eventually intend to do. So, for my first post, one of my more recent 'paintings'. Something of Hixnu, I'm sure you can tell a lot about him from his expression. If you can't, think Benjamin Horne, except crazier.